Oil Rig Spaceports. What on Earth could SpaceX be doing | by Samantha Falcucci | ILLUMINATION | Jan, 2021 – Medium

Two old oil rigs have been spotted in South Texas sporting giant name tags of Mars moons. Who other than SpaceX and Elon Musk would be behind such an acquisition?

SpaceX is refurbishing two former oil drilling rigs near their Brownsville, TX site. Aptly named Deimos and Phobos after Mars two moons, these future spaceports may be our terminals to deep space. Musk first revealed his vision for offshore launch and landing facilities in 2017 in its Earth to Earth plan a captivating video showcasing passengers boarding a Starship from the NYC coastline and landing in Shanghai in 39 minutes. Starship has since evolved into the spacecraft synonymous with Mars colonization as the worlds most powerful launch vehicle able to carry over 100 metric tons to Earth orbit. However, these futuristic plans are logistically dependent on a whirlwind launch schedule to support Starship refueling and launch-landing operations. This will require a lot of sites certainly more than Cape Canaveral and Boca Chica. Consider how efficient and frequent the airline system would be if the United States only had HOU and MCO airports.

But rockets are loud. Super Heavy Starships with over forty Raptor engines are really loud. Unless Zillow plans to add proximity-to-spaceport and sonic boom noise pollution to real estate listings, the launch pads may need to be located elsewhere. Placing spaceports farther in an unpopulated landscape offshore helps to combat noise levels, establish a wider perimeter of safety, and leverage a vast aquatic surface area for more launch pad facilities.

SpaceX is building floating, super heavy-class spaceports for Mars, moon & hypersonic travel around Earth Elon Musk, June 2020

Photos spotting the rigs earlier this week show Deimos already emblazoned with its name on lifeboats and heliport. The two oil rigs will require extensive adjustments before the vision is realized and SpaceX has quite a bit still to prove with Starships viability to not only carry humans but launch and land in one piece. Last month, SpaceX completed a high-altitude flight of its SN8 prototype by sending it about 40,000 feet above the Texas coastline. Despite a crash landing, it provided valuable data for the team to iterate on and was deemed successful. SN9 is rolled out on the pad and has been undergoing static fire tests over the last few days, and space fans have been eagerly tracking Boca Chica airspace and local road closures. Though on Thursday evening, amidst very thick fog, another off-nominal static test fire occurred.

No country or private company has launched deep space missions from oceanic platforms but thats certainly never stopped SpaceX from anything. Over the weekend, they kicked off 2021 by launching another set of Starlink satellites and elegantly landed the Falcon 9's first stage on a drone ship in the Atlantic Ocean for a record 8th time. Theyve certainly got landing on water down so the only way left is up.

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Oil Rig Spaceports. What on Earth could SpaceX be doing | by Samantha Falcucci | ILLUMINATION | Jan, 2021 - Medium