Elon Musk insists SpaceX will land ‘starships’ on Mars ‘well before 2030’ – Daily Star

Posted: March 31, 2021 at 3:13 am

Elon Musk has insisted his company will be landing rockets on Mars "well before 2030".

The SpaceX CEO also warned European space agencies should watch they don't become obsolete as they're out-competed by the likes of his mammoth company.

Responding to reports that Europe will only begin to study competitive rocket computing technology from 2030, Musk tweeted: "SpaceX will be landing Starships [reusable rockets] on Mars well before 2030."

He said of European space companies: "They are aiming too low. Only rockets that are fully and rapidly reusable will be competitive.

"Everything else will seem like a cloth biplane in the age of jets."

In recent years Europe has lagged behind competitors in the space travel sphere while SpaceX has eaten away at the bloc's market share through cost-cutting measures such as reusable rockets.

In a follow-up tweet Musk said: "The really hard threshold is making Mars Base Alpha self-sustaining."

Mars Base Alpha is the codename for SpaceX's planned human colony on the Red Planet.

Musk has been adamant that human travel to Mars is possible in our lifetime and has long been working on a supposed plan to send colonists to build a new civilisation on the planet.

These travellers should be "prepared to die" in the process of achieving this goal, he has said.

Although in 2016 he planned to send the first human-carrying rocket to Mars by 2025, he has recently adjusted that timeline, saying it's "possible to make a self-sustaining city on Mars by 2050, if we start in five years".

Musk's ambition has been mocked by many critics from around the world, including the UK's Astronomer Royal Lord Martin Rees.

"The idea of Elon Musk to have a million people settle on Mars is a dangerous delusion," he told the World Government Summit panel this week.

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"Living on Mars is no better than living on the South Pole or the tip of Mount Everest."

Celebrity scientist Neil Degrasse Tyson also poured cold water on the plans at the summit.

"To ship a billion people to another planet to help them survive a catastrophe on Earth seems unrealistic," he said.

"If you want to call Mars home, you need to terraform Mars, turn it into Earth."

In the past SpaceX had suggested terraforming the surface of Mars to make it more Earth-like would be part of its plan, but NASA dismissed this as impossible in 2018.

Last week even Bernie Sanders took aim at Musk, calling his gigantic personal wealth (approximately $165 billion or 120 billion) "immoral" when so much of our planet suffers in poverty.

"Space travel is an exciting idea, but right now we need to focus on Earth and create a progressive tax system so that children don't go hungry, people are not homeless and all Americans have healthcare," the socialist senator tweeted.

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Elon Musk insists SpaceX will land 'starships' on Mars 'well before 2030' - Daily Star

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