What the NASA-SpaceX Launch Means for the Future of Space Travel
Elon Musk has been one of the leading names of technology and innovation in the 21st century. His entrepreneurial career began in the early 2000’s when he founded x.com (1). Musk’s company was then sold to PayPal, of which he later became the CEO. PayPal was then sold to eBay and, as the company’s largest shareholder, Musk walked away with $165 million dollars (1). He used this money to start companies and projects such as Tesla, The Boring Company, the hyperloop, and SpaceX. All of these entities have the ambitious goal of revolutionizing modern day transportation. Recently, SpaceX has been in the news for its greatest achievement to date: a successful manned launch into outer space using the world’s first reusable rocket.
Musk founded SpaceX in 2002 with the long term goal of developing commercial spaceflight and inspiring Mars exploration. Almost 20 years later, the company has taken its furthest step towards reaching that goal. On May 30, 2020, at exactly 3:22 pm, the weather finally permitted for NASA and SpaceX’s joint mission: Demo-2. Demo-2 was SpaceX’s first mission with astronauts in the company’s 18 year history. It was also the U.S.’s first crewed space mission in almost nine years (2). Astronauts Bob Behnken and Douglas Hurley have successfully made it to the International Space Station (ISS) aboard the Crew Dragon space shuttle, and they will return from their mission in approximately 100 days. The goal of the Demo-2 mission was to validate the SpaceX crew transportation system (3). This system, specifically the rocket itself, is called Falcon-9.
Falcon-9 is a reusable, two-stage rocket designed and manufactured by SpaceX for the reliable and safe transport of people and payloads into Earth’s orbit and beyond (4). It stands 70 meters tall (229.6 ft) and weighs 549,054 kg (1,207,920 lbs) (4). After liftoff, the spacecraft (Crew Dragon) carrying the astronauts and supplies separates from the rocket into orbit. The rocket’s engine used to launch the spacecraft falls back to Earth and self-lands on an autonomous drone. Falcon-9’s reusability allows for the most expensive parts of the rocket to be reflown, which significantly drives down the cost. SpaceX has successfully demonstrated that it is capable of bringing people to and from the ISS both economically and safely. It is their first step towards Musk’s ultimate goal of bringing people to and from a colony on Mars.
This mission also marks the end of Russia’s spaceflight monopoly. The United States and Russia have cooperated in space since the 1970’s (2). When NASA retired the space shuttle, the only path into space was Russia’s Soyuz spacecraft (2). Realizing this, Russia used its spaceflight monopoly to charge more per round trip ticket for each NASA astronaut (2). Since 2008, the cost had risen from about $21 million per seat to more than $90 million per seat (2). SpaceX’s Crew Dragon space shuttle is projected to cost $55 million per seat (2), which will force Russia to drive down their cost, or perhaps encourage Russian astronauts to fly on American spacecrafts instead in the future.
Perhaps this achievement will convince the federal government to realign its space exploration priorities, since no major development has been achieved since the Challenger. Nobody has been to the moon in 40 plus years, and a lot of that has been due to “political risk,” according to NASA administrator Jim Bridenstein (5). In other words, presidents and Congress do not finish the projects of their predecessor. For example, George W. Bush’s administration tasked NASA with replacing its current space shuttle (5). NASA spent $9 billion dollars over five years designing, building, and testing hardware for that human spaceflight program (5). However, when the Obama administration took over, the idea was scrapped, and he ordered a new program to be NASA’s priority. Then, the Trump administration changed Obama’s goal of launching astronauts to an asteroid to his own, landing on the Moon and Mars (5). These changes to NASA’s priorities have resulted in a loss of $20 billion dollars and years of wasted time and momentum (5). Since SpaceX is a private company, they are not under federal control, which means they can set their own priorities aside from the government. However, NASA is controlled by the federal budget ($21.5 billion dollars) (5), which means that the current administration has a major say in their priorities. Hopefully this launch has demonstrated that progress can only be achieved through a consistent goal.
Although the mission is not technically accomplished yet, Demo-2 has successfully demonstrated that SpaceX’s Falcon-9 rocket can bring astronauts into orbit and safely return the most expensive parts of the rocket back to Earth. This is perhaps the world’s greatest achievement towards sustained human presence in space. With all that he has accomplished to date, it is reasonable to claim that Elon Musk’s cameo in Iron Man 2 is a tribute to the fact that he is the real life Tony Stark.
Works Cited:
Brehese, Tami. The 'PayPal Mafia' formed in the early 2000s, and includes everyone from Elon Musk to the Yelp founders. Here's where the original members have ended up. Business Insider. [Online] November 24, 2019. [Cited: June 9, 2020.] https://www.businessinsider.com/paypal-mafia-members-careers-elon-musk-peter-thiel-reid-hoffman-2019-11#elon-musk-founded-a-payments-company-called-xcom-which-merged-with-thiels-confinity-in-2000-he-was-named-ceo-of-paypal-but-it-didn't-last-7.
Mosher, Dave. SpaceX is about to launch its first astronauts, and the stakes for Elon Musk's rocket company and NASA are epic. Business Insider. [Online] May 21, 2020. [Cited: June 9, 2020.] https://www.businessinsider.com/spacex-rocket-launch-nasa-astronauts-demo2-commercial-crew-mission-history-2020-5.
National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). NASA Astronauts Launch from America in Historic Test Flight of SpaceX Crew Dragon. National Aeronautics and Space Administration. [Online] May 30, 2020. [Cited: June 9, 2020.] https://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasa-astronauts-launch-from-america-in-historic-test-flight-of-spacex-crew-dragon.
SpaceX. FALCON 9. SpaceX. [Online] [Cited: June 2020, 9.] https://www.spacex.com/vehicles/falcon-9/.
Mosher, Dave and Brueck, Hilary. Astronauts explain why nobody has visited the moon in more than 45 years — and the reasons are depressing. Business Insider. [Online] July 19, 2019. [Cited: June 9, 2020.] https://www.businessinsider.com/moon-missions-why-astronauts-have-not-returned-2018-7.
