Elon Musk Shares New Photos Of SpaceX Mars Mission Rocket 'Starship'

The strides made by SpaceX in developing the Starship rocket meant for Moon and Mars missions had been reinforced by the latest photos revealed by CEO Elon Musk.

Starship is deemed a next-generation space vehicle by SpaceX to send cargo and almost 100 people to the Moon and Mars.

According to SpaceX news, Elon Musk teased the pictures of the space vehicle after conjoining the fin at the facility in Texas.

“Adding the rear moving fins to Starship Mk1 in Boca Chica, Texas,” Musk tweeted on Sunday.

The photos prominently showed the stainless steel hull of the rocket after two large fins were fitted to the base.

SpaceX has reused parts of its Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy rockets in the construction of this rocket.

The company expects Starship would enhance the company’s ambitions as the design is fully reusable, and launching and landing in one piece makes the spaceflight similar to commercial air travel.

Calibrated testing of rocket with the prototype

SpaceX recently made news when it flew a prototype “Starhopper” to a height of 500 feet altitude on a short flight. The one minute flight was successful as it landed back on a concrete pad perfectly.

The Starship test program will now start with feature flights of the rocket to an altitude of two miles and then to 62 miles, reaching the edge of space.

SpaceX has raised funds of over $1.3 billion in new equity this year, to finance the Starship program and Starlink – an Internet satellite project of SpaceX.

Musk stated that the top part of Starship will have large, moving fins along with a large array of other hardware.

But Starhopper prototype had only one Raptor engine, whereas Starship will have three engines. Musk also shared that SpaceX adjusted one key element of Starship’s design. The modification brings two large fins at the base instead of three.

Musk also said SpaceX will follow this plan in the first two rockets.

“Current analysis, which I’m not fully bought into, suggests that 2 rear fins with separate airframe-mounted legs will be lighter, so this is the plan for Mk1/Mk2,” Musk elaborated.

The term Starship also resonates with the name of a popular rock band Jefferson Starship based in California. The band came into prominence after the breakup of the Jefferson Airplane in the early 1970s.

Top Mars scientist joins Amazon’s space company

Meanwhile, leading Mars scientist Steve Squyres joined Blue Origin, the space venture owned by Amazon owner and billionaire Jeff Bezos. He will be the chief scientist at Blue Origin.

Blue Origin also confirmed Squyres’ appointment. Squyres is associated with Cornell University and was the principal investigator behind Mars rovers such as Spirit and Opportunity.

He also served as a top astronomer in many space missions of NASA including Voyager and Magellan’s Venus voyage.

Squyres has also authored a famous book: “Roving Mars: Spirit, Opportunity and the Exploration of the Red Planet.”

The Mars rovers set off on an exploration mission to different parts on Mars in 2004.

Although the experiment was meant for a limited duration the Spirit lasted six years. The opportunity also sent seamless data until it was damaged in a Martian storm in 2018.

Per NASA news, the twin Mars rovers missions closed in February this year. One key inference from rover missions has been that centuries ago, Mars was hospitable to life than today both in terms of wetness and warmth.