The next presentation of the vessel of Elon Musk will mark 12 months of rapid progress

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Elon Musk, CEO of SpaceX, is poised to provide a much-anticipated update to the company's Starship program on Sept. 28 in Boca Chica, Texas. The presentation is expected to take place in front of the first nearly completed Starship prototype, which represents 12 months of rapid progress during which the program has moved from fantasy to reality.

In recent years, Musk has organized annual presentations on the state of next-generation SpaceX vehicles designed to colonize the Moon and Mars.

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Although vehicle names have changed many times over the years, the spaceship is currently called Starship and its first-floor recall is calling Very heavy.

The system is designed to be fully reusable – Super Heavy and Starship being able to land propulsively.

During last year's presentation, Musk announced that Japanese billionaire Yusaku Maezawa had bought a flight to send Maezawa and several artists around the moon. Although the news caught the attention of many people, the pitcher was still in its infancy.

A prototype carbon fiber tank barrel and some small Raptor engines were all that SpaceX had to show for the physical hardware.

In addition, on the SpaceX launch site in Boca Chica, there was little more than a pile of land. And the situation was similar in a planned Starship factory at the Port of Los Angeles.

Although the concept was exciting, the launch system was far from ready to take off.

12 months later, Starship's development is radically different.

In Boca Chica, the pile of land was turned into an operational launch site with the ground support equipment needed to conduct flight tests of Starship methane vehicles.

Two unattached flights of a test vehicle called Starhopper have already taken place on the bridge, the most recent at an altitude of 150 meters.

In addition, at the nearby operations center, the first high-speed spacecraft is nearing completion and should be the backdrop for the next presentation.

And if that were not enough, a second Starship prototype is also nearing completion near Cape Canaveral, Florida. This vehicle will be launched from the Kennedy Space Center's 39A platform, which is already undergoing renovations to prepare for the next flight of the spacecraft.

As for the Los Angeles Harbor factory, she was scrapped just weeks after Musk's presentation in 2018. The cancellation was made after a radical change in plans that saw the Starship and Super designs Heavy switch from carbon fiber to steel.

This change was intended to reduce the technical complexity of the project and eliminate the need for a plant with advanced machinery.

As a result, SpaceX now assembles the vehicles near their launch site, transporting a rocket nine meters in diameter over thousands of kilometers is far from ideal.

The abandonment of carbon fiber has quickly paid off. Steel is an easier material to work with, and therefore within weeks, the first prototype vehicle was assembled in Boca Chica.

The activity is a radical change for the local community. For years, Boca Chica's facilities had been inactive, with SpaceX Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy rocket launching projects unheard of.

However, in the last weeks of 2018, a steel structure nine meters in diameter began to rise in South Texas. It was the debut of Starhopper, a Starship test bench designed to perform small jumps with the help of a large-scale Raptor engine.

Starhopper under construction in Boca Chica, Texas, late 2018 via Nomadd for NSF L2

In March 2019, the vehicle was ready for action. In the following months, he conducted numerous tests, including three static fires and two flight tests. The flight tests enabled the vehicle to reach a height of 18 meters on 25 July. This was followed by a flight at 150 meters on August 27th.

The jump of 150 meters was the last flight of Starhopper. It is now ready to be converted into a vertical Raptor test rig – the flight test campaign moving to a large-scale prototype of the spacecraft.

Named Starship Mk1, the new prototype is expected to fly at much higher altitudes – with a planned launch of around 20 kilometers in the coming weeks.

To do this, the vehicle will be much more advanced than the single-starter Starbagper. Not only will it be much bigger, but the Mk1 will also be equipped with a landing gear, rudders and three Raptor engines.

A fin is installed on the Starship Mk1 prototype via BocaChicaGal for NSF

The SpaceX teams raced day and night to prepare the Mk1 vehicle for the 28 September presentation – with the goal of having the vehicle's main structure fully assembled in time for the event.

During the presentation, Musk is expected to present the current status of the program, including methane-powered Raptor engines, launch site developments and changes to Starship's design since the last presentation.

As in all previous years, this year's update will again include a change in the aerodynamic surfaces of the vehicle – used to help the spacecraft navigate the atmosphere before landing.

However, the latest design evolution is expected to be much more advanced than in previous years – SpaceX having allocated significantly more resources to the program in the last 12 months.

Slight adjustments to the Super Heavy Booster – the first step that will launch Starship into orbit from Earth – should also be announced at the weekend's presentation.

The number of Raptor engines on Super Heavy will be an area of ​​special interest because it has changed several times during its development.

The renderings and potentially an animation of the launch of Starship and Super Heavy from Boca Chica and Pad 39A are also highly anticipated.

The plans for launch pads have only been realized in recent months and many of the details in the environmental documents are already out of date.

What is known is that modifications are being made to prepare the pads of Boca Chica and the Kennedy Space Center for their respective activities on the spacecraft.

In Boca Chica, Texas, construction is well underway to move the Starhopper launch pad to Starship.

Since Starship is significantly larger than the Starhopper, the vehicle will require an additional propellant. Thus, the teams worked to increase the propellant storage capacity at the launch site.

More specifically, a large tank of liquid oxygen was moved Thursday to a storage site located in the launch area.

The launch site of Boca Chica should also see the addition of a launch pad for Starship. Unlike Starhopper, which broke away directly from the concrete slab, the Mk1 prototype will be slightly elevated by a steel structure.

Similar activities are underway at 39A's Kennedy Space Center in Florida, where this launch site is also gearing up for spaceship flights.

Pad 39A will soon be used for Starship Mk2 prototype flights. The Florida-based Mk2 vehicle is almost identical to the Texas-based Mk1 prototype and will also be used for high-altitude test flights.

A rendering of what Starship Mk2 looks like on the pad via Jay DeShetler for NSF L2

The Mk2 prototype will be launched from a new launch bracket similar to the one prepared for installation in Boca Chica.

It is understood that the 39A platform mount is being built in the Horizontal Integration Center (HIF) launch site. HIF is normally used to store Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy rockets.

SpaceX officially started the basic work of the launching montage on Thursday night. The next morning, bulldozers and other heavy machinery were spotted at the parking area.

This work is expected to take a few weeks, with the launch facility shortly thereafter.

However, it will take a little longer for the required ground support equipment to be in place and ready for launch.

Unlike Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy, which use kerosene fuel, Starship uses methane. SpaceX will have to install additional fuel tanks to make the Pad 39A compatible.

If all goes well, the Boca Chica and 39A Starship tablets will then be converted to support a full stack of ships, including the Super Heavy First Recoil stage. The addition of the first stage will make flights into orbit.

When and how this will happen will be a topic of interest at the next weekend's presentation.

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