Tag: Elon Musk

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Elon Musk lifts the veil on Falcon Heavy rocket

Falcon Heavy rocket
SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy rocket makes use of 27 Merlin engines arranged on three cores. (SpaceX via Elon Musk / Twitter)

SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy rocket just got more real, now that billionaire founder Elon Musk has tweeted out pictures of the triple-barreled launch vehicle.

The late-night tweet was accompanied by three views of the rocket cores being processed at SpaceX’s Florida facility in preparation for the rocket’s first test liftoff. That’s scheduled to take place next month from Launch Complex 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center.

There was nary a sign of what’ll go on top of the rocket — a payload shroud that’s due to contain Musk’s cherry-red Tesla Roadster sports car, set up to play David Bowie’s “Space Oddity” on the sound system.

But Twitter fans were enchanted nevertheless by the sight of the triple-cored rocket, bristling with 27 Merlin engines at its bottom. “OMG” was a common reaction.

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Will CEOs set up a Boeing vs. SpaceX race to Mars?

Musk and Muilenburg
SpaceX’s Elon Musk and Boeing’s Dennis Muilenburg have something of a space rivalry going on. (Elon Musk via Twitter; Dennis Muilenburg via Boeing)

So what does SpaceX CEO Elon Musk think of Boeing CEO Dennis Muilenburg’s claim that the first people to set foot on Mars will arrive on a Boeing rocket? “Do it,” Musk tweeted, in one of many two-word comebacks that might have come to mind.

The latest round of media jousting started when CNBC’s Jim Cramer brought up Mars during an interview with Muilenburg. “Who’s going to get a man on Mars first, you or Elon Musk?” Cramer asked.

In response, Muilenburg touted the Space Launch System, the heavy-lift rocket that Boeing is helping NASA build for deep-space missions.

“We’re going to take a first test flight in 2019, and we’re going to do a slingshot mission around the moon,” he said. “Eventually, we’re going to go to Mars, and I firmly believe the first person that sets foot on Mars will get there on a Boeing rocket.”

Muilenburg said pretty much the same thing last year during an industry conference in Chicago, but since then, Musk has laid out a vision that calls for sending settlers to Mars on SpaceX’s yet-to-be-built monster spaceship starting in the 2020s.

If Musk and NASA stick to their current schedules, the first bootprints on the Martian surface would be left by folks arriving on a SpaceX rocket as much as a decade before the Space Launch System sends a spaceship there.

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Launching a sports car to Mars? Questions abound

Falcon Heavy
An artist’s conception shows the launch of SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy rocket. (SpaceX via YouTube)

Billionaire CEO Elon Musk tweeted out the idea of putting a cherry-red Tesla Roadster on SpaceX’s first Falcon Heavy rocket and sending it toward Mars, sparking lots of questions in the process.

The first question has to be: Is he serious?

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Elon Musk will bid to build Chicago transit ‘loop’

Hyperloop
Elon Musk’s original Hyperloop concept called for passengers to travel through pneumatic tubes in pods. (Tesla / SpaceX Illustration)

A loop to the Loop? It could happen: Billionaire Elon Musk says he’s willing to build an express transit system that links downtown Chicago with O’Hare International Airport.

Musk’s expression of interest came in response to Chicago’s “request for qualifications” relating to the system — which would be designed to cut travel times to 20 minutes or less, for a fare that costs less than a taxi or ride-hailing service. The Chicago Tribune said the fare could be in the range of $25 or more.

In a tweet, Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel said the express route would “give Chicagoans and visitors to our great city more options, faster travel time, and build on Chicago’s competitive advantage as a global hub of tourism, transportation and trade.”

No public funding would be provided. Instead, the concessionaire would have to finance the project and earn the money back from fares, advertising revenue and other sources.

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Flipping robot sparks AI warning from Elon Musk

Atlas robot
The Atlas humanoid robot sets up for a backflip. (Boston Dynamics via YouTube)

Boston Dynamics’ video of a humanoid robot executing a perfect backflip sparked a lot of dark humor, and now billionaire Elon Musk has responded with dark seriousness about the risks posed by super-intelligent, super-agile bots.

Musk suggested that future robots could move so fast they could match the fictional Flash, who eludes his comic-book foes by moving too fast for the eye to see. Compared to that superpower, doing human-level backflips is “nothing,” Musk said in a tweet.

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Elon Musk hits deadline for big Australian battery

Battery bank
Tesla installed the batteries at Neoen’s Hornsdale Wind Farm in South Australia. (Tesla Illustration)

It’s a rare day when Tesla CEO Elon Musk actually finishes a job before the deadline, but that’s what happened with the massive 100-megawatt battery bank that his company built in South Australia.

The world’s largest lithium-ion battery bank has now been fully installed at Neoen’s Hornsdale Wind Farm and is set to be energized for the first time in a matter of days, South Australia’s state government announced today.

In response to a plea from Australian billionaire Mike Cannon-Brookes, Musk promised in July to get the array of Powerpacks installed within 100 days of signing a grid connection agreement, or else the job would be done for free.

Musk had some wiggle room: By the time the agreement was actually signed on Sept. 29, Tesla had already completed half the project. Nevertheless, he was taking a risk on a project that’s thought to cost tens of millions of dollars.

Tonight Musk tweeted his congratulations to the team.

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Elon Musk unveils Tesla Semi and a new Roadster

Elon Musk with Tesla Semi and Roadster
Tesla CEO Elon Musk introduces the Semi truck and an updated Roadster. (Tesla via YouTube)

Tesla CEO Elon Musk rode in with revelations about his company’s all-electric Semi truck, but walked off with an even bigger surprise: a new version of the Tesla Roadster that breaks records for speed and range.

Tonight’s unveiling at Tesla’s design studio in Hawthorne, Calif., set a new standard for hype, with hundreds of fans cheering in the stands. But if Musk follows through on the promised specs, the Semi and the Roadster should set new standards for electric vehicles. And for vehicles, period.

“The point of doing this is just to give a hard-core smackdown to gasoline cars,” Musk said after showing off a red Roadster prototype. “Driving a gasoline sports car is going to feel like a steam engine with a side of quiche.”

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Elon Musk frets about love life (and sheds tears)

Elon Musk on Rolling Stone
Elon Musk graces the cover of the new issue of Rolling Stone magazine. (Mark Seliger Photo for Rolling Stone)

Elon Musk may know how to get to Mars with SpaceX, and how to revolutionize the transportation industry with Tesla and the Hyperloop, but he’s still trying to figure out how to find true love.

“It’s so hard for me to even meet people,” the 46-year-old billionaire tells the Rolling Stone’s Neil Strauss during a surprisingly candid interview. “I’m looking for a long-term relationship. I’m not looking for a one-night stand. I’m looking for a serious companion or soulmate, that kind of thing.”

During another interview with Strauss, Musk teared up as he discussed his troubled childhood relationship with his father. “I can’t remember the last time I cried,” he says.

Musk has been profiled dozens of times before, but his softer side is on full display in the profile published online today.

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Elon Musk pushes ahead with his tunnel venture

Boring machine
The tunnel boring machine nicknamed “Godot” sits in a below-ground chamber. Elon Musk reportedly acquired the pre-owned machine from L.A. Metro. (Elon Musk via Instagram)

One of billionaire Elon Musk’s lesser-known ventures is taking the spotlight with word that The Boring Company is looking into digging a rapid-transit tunnel between Baltimore and Washington, D.C.

That’s not all: Musk says the company is putting the finishing touches on a second tunneling machine, which will be nicknamed Line-Storm as a tribute to a Robert Frost poem. The first machine is named Godot, after the Samuel Beckett play. It’s being employed to dig a tunnel in Hawthorne, Calif., where Musk’s SpaceX rocket venture is headquartered.

Musk is even selling Boring Company hats. More than 6,400 of them, at last report.

In June, the CEO of SpaceX and Tesla estimated that he spent only about 2 percent of his working time on The Boring Company, which focuses on lowering the cost of tunneling to facilitate high-speed underground transit. He must have saved up a lot of that time for this week.

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Elon Musk geeks out over his Big Falcon Rocket

BFR talk by Elon Musk
SpaceX founder Elon Musk discusses his plan to build a “Big Falcon Spaceship” at the International Astronautical Congress in Australia. Musk followed up with an “Ask Me Anything” chat on Reddit. (SpaceX via YouTube)

SpaceX CEO says he “chickened out” and made the design for the monster spaceship he’s planning to send to Mars a little less monstrous — in order to make the concept a lot more realistic.

He also confirmed that testing for the BFR, euphemistically known as the “Big Falcon Rocket,” would begin with suborbital short-hop tests on Earth.

Musk’s frank talk came today during an “Ask Me Anything” chat session conductedon Reddit’s space forum. More than 10,000 comments streamed in during the session, which Musk had promised to hold in the wake of September’s unveiling of the latest BFR concept at the International Astronautical Congress in Australia.

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