According to The Verge, SpaceX CEO Elon Musk said,He hopes his company’s launch facility in Boca Chica, Texas, will receive regulatory approval by March and the first orbital launch of SpaceX’s new Starship rocket will take place sometime this year.
Musk made the comments while speaking about Starship for the first time since 2019, speaking at the company’s test facility in Boca Chica, Texas, on Thursday night. Standing in front of the towering prototype rocket, Musk outlined some of the rocket’s latest specs, why he’s pursuing deep space travel, and when he expects all of those plans to come to fruition.
This was his fifth speech on Starship, and Musk’s presentation on Thursday night lasted more than an hour. However, the CEO didn’t offer any major updates to Starship that he hasn’t revealed before. During the event’s question-and-answer session, some new details emerged regarding projected costs and future flight plans. But for die-hard SpaceX fans, this is more or less a repeat of what Musk has said before. The timing appears to be carefully calculated, given the impending decision by the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) on whether to approve the launch of Starship into orbit from Boca Chica.
“Life can’t just be about solving problems,” Musk said of why pursuing interstellar travel is worthwhile. “There has to be something that motivates you, that gets you moving.” That’s a reason he’s used in the past.
Starship is SpaceX’s next generation of large rockets designed to take passengers and cargo to deep-space destinations like the moon and Mars. It’s a fully reusable system, and the Starship is to be launched into space on a huge booster rocket called the Super Heavy. Using its main “Raptor” engine, the Starship will be able to land on the surfaces of other worlds as well as on Earth. The Super Heavy booster will also be able to land back on Earth after launch.
Perhaps what reporters want to know most is what SpaceX is doing with its launch license from the FAA. The FAA is currently deciding whether to approve SpaceX’s launch of Starship from Boca Chica, as the agency is responsible for making sure launches to orbit don’t pose a danger to people or property not involved. While the approval process has been heavily polarized, with some environmentalists arguing that the FAA needs to conduct a more in-depth review of Starship’s impact on the surrounding area, Musk said he thinks the decision will benefit SpaceX. “We don’t have a lot of knowledge about the FAA situation,” Musk said. “We’ve got some kind of rough indication that there might be an approval in March.”
The Verge reached out to the FAA for comment but received no response by press time.
SpaceX has been actively developing Starship over the past few years, and the company’s launch site is located in Boca Chica. At this base, just north of the border, SpaceX engineers have been building prototype after prototype while conducting various tests of the vehicle. So far, the company has carried out several high-altitude flights with prototypes, launching them to more than 32,000 feet above Earth before attempting to bring them down to the ground. Its purpose is to test the ability of Starship to use its engines to gently land on Earth, a landing technique that will eventually be used when landing on other worlds. In all of these tests, SpaceX managed to land only one prototype, which didn’t explode afterwards.
Now, SpaceX is focusing on launching Starship into orbit to prove that the vehicle is indeed capable of going into space. While SpaceX may still have more work to do to get it ready for launch, a big hurdle for the rocket company is regulatory approval. And the FAA’s decision-making process has been fraught with turbulence, as SpaceX’s plans in Boca Chica have expanded considerably in recent years.
The FAA approved SpaceX’s launch from Boca Chica back in 2014, and even prepared a full Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) detailing how the launch site will affect the surrounding area and wildlife refuge. But that approval was again decided when SpaceX planned to launch its smaller Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy rockets from the region. Now that SpaceX wants to launch Starship from Boca Chica, the FAA must determine whether the company can continue and launch regularly into orbit, whether changes to the site are required, or whether a new EIS is required. The latter option will take a lot of time as the FAA consults with more experts and gathers more data on SpaceX’s footprint in Boca Chica and its potential impact on the surrounding environment.
The FAA has said it plans to make a decision by the end of February, making the timing of Musk’s conversation more relevant and perhaps a way to put pressure on the FAA. SpaceX is really banking on being able to launch from the company’s Boca Chica site, which the company calls Starbase. Musk believes the remote site allows SpaceX to conduct more experimental flights than the company’s other major launch sites in Cape Canaveral, Florida. Musk said: “Because we have a lot of launches at Cape Canaveral, we don’t want to disrupt the Cape Canaveral activities, operational launches, and advanced R&D on Starship. So decoupling operational launches from R&D launches Very important.”
Musk did point out that SpaceX could use Cape Canaveral in the future if the FAA doesn’t approve Starbase right away. “We do have an alternative to Cape Canaveral,” Musk said. “We actually applied for environmental approval for a launch from Cape Canaveral a few years ago and received it.” He noted that the worst-case scenario is that SpaceX will be delayed by up to eight months as the company pays for the card A launch tower was developed at Cape Naveral so that the starship could be launched there.
Even if Starbase does get approval, it’s unclear when SpaceX will actually be ready to launch. Musk said he is “very confident” that Starship will enter orbit this year, and SpaceX hopes to make its first orbital attempt once the company gets FAA approval. But he offered few specific details about the latest advances in Starship hardware development. “I think we’re close to having the hardware ready,” Musk said. “So right now, I think we’re on track to get regulatory approval and hardware readiness at the same time.”