https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wPcz7X43_zU
The crimson Tesla Roadster from Elon Musk’s pioneering electric automotive industry is set to go this week where no sports car has gone before – into space.
On Tuesday evening, a test flight of the new Falcon Heavy ‘jumbo’ rocket built by the transportation company Space Exploration Technologies, founded by entrepreneur Elon Musk, who also founded Tesla Motors, is expected.
If the launch is successful, Falcon Heavy will become the most powerful rocket in existence and the most powerful spacecraft to launch from the U.S. since NASA last sent astronauts to the Moon with Saturn 5 rockets 45 years ago.
“I love the idea of a car driving endlessly through space. Maybe it will be discovered by alien life in the future,” tweeted billionaire entrepreneur and founder of Tesla and SpaceX, Elon Musk.
The success of this launch will likely give California’s SpaceX a competitive edge over rivals seeking large contracts with NASA, U.S. military and satellite companies, and even paying space tourists.
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Falcon Heavy, powered by 27 engines providing thrust, is built from three Falcon 9 rockets – one in the center and two on the sides serving as boosters. These two rockets are expected to land with parachutes at Cape Canaveral after launch, while the central rocket is to land on a ship in the Atlantic after flight.
The spacecraft is already positioned on the launch pad at Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida, which was used by Saturn 5 carrying the three-member Apollo 11 crew on its historic mission in 1969, culminating in Neil Armstrong’s and Buzz Aldrin’s first steps on the lunar surface.
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The passenger riding atop Falcon Heavy will be the Tesla Roadster, and thus, if the mission is successful, it will be the first vehicle sent into solar orbit.
“I love the idea of a car driving endlessly through space. Maybe it will be discovered by alien life in the future,” tweeted billionaire entrepreneur and founder of Tesla and SpaceX, Elon Musk.
Falcon Heavy is designed to carry significantly more weight than that car, and SpaceX boasts its ability to send a payload of approximately 70 tons into Earth’s orbit, at a cost of $90 million per launch.
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This is double the capacity of the existing U.S. space fleet, made up of Delta 4 Heavy from the United Launch Alliance (ULA), a joint venture of Lockheed Martin and Boeing, and at just a quarter of the current cost.
The new rocket is expected to allow SpaceX to enter two key arenas that require greater capacity than that provided by Falcon 9, namely geostationary orbital missions for delivering satellites that orbit the Earth’s equator at the same pace as the Earth rotates and for research beyond Earth.
