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It will be a great evening for space tourism. SpaceX private spaceflight company will unveil its first passenger for a moonlit ride on the company's massive BFR rocket and watch it live on the internet. SpaceX's CEO, Elon Musk, has even dropped on Twitter some tantalizing previews of BFR's new rocket design.
SpaceX will unveil its BFR rocket passenger (the Big Falcon Rocket name) in a webcast tonight (September 17) at its Hawthorne, California headquarters. You can watch it live here, courtesy of SpaceX, from 9pm. EDT (0100 Sept 18 GMT).
The expected revelation comes after the surprise announcement of SpaceX, Thursday, September 13, that she had signed her first passenger to go around the moon on his spaceship BFR. [The BFR in Images: SpaceX’s Giant Spaceship for Mars & Beyond]
"SpaceX has signed with the world's first private passenger to ride the moon aboard our BFR launcher – an important step to allow ordinary people who dream of traveling in space to access it", said representatives of SpaceX. announced on Twitter on Thursday. "Find out who's flying and why on Monday, September 17th."
– Elon Musk (@elonmusk) September 17, 2018
Musk, the founder of SpaceX, has left more marks on the passenger's identity and the new design of BFR since.
In a pair of Twitter messages early in the morning, Musk unveiled new artist renderings of the BFR spacecraft. The images seem to confirm the changes made to the BFR crew spacecraft, including three huge fins and a black heat shield mounted on the belly. The spacecraft will also have a "deployable forward mobile wing" near its nose, according to Musk.
– Elon Musk (@elonmusk) September 17, 2018
Late Thursday, Musk also left a trace of where the SpaceX BFR passenger came from when he posted a single Japanese emoji flag on Twitter. Whatever the passenger, it's a safe bet that he's extremely wealthy. Trips to the international space station cost more than $ 35 million for space tourists, and SpaceX's moonlighting is much higher.
"Only 24 humans have been on the moon in history – no one has visited since the last Apollo mission in 1972," they added. This last Apollo lunar mission was Apollo 17 in December 1972.
And then there is the rocket.
Musk unveiled for the first time SpaceX's BFR launch system in 2016 as the spacecraft and dedicated propeller will use the launch of the people and cargo needed to build a colony on Mars. In 2017, Musk refined these plans with a lighter spacecraft and BFR amplifier, but the essence of the design – a giant spacecraft capable of flying 100 people and a propeller to launch it into orbit – remained the even. BFR also has another nickname at SpaceX, the Big F ****** Rocket, which is not safe for work.
Musk said he hoped that BFR could be ready for an unsupervised trip to Mars in 2022, with a crew flight to follow in 2024.
Musk also said that the BFR launch system would eventually replace SpaceX's Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy rockets. It will be able to launch up to 150 tons in low Earth orbit (more than NASA's Saturn V Moon rocket), fly to the moon, Mars or other destinations, and even perform passenger trips around Earth, said Musk.
While waiting for SpaceX's big announcement tonight, it's important to remember that the company has already made an announcement like this one.
In 2017, Musk announced that SpaceX would launch two passengers around the moon this year using its heavy rocket Falcon Heavy and its Dragon spacecraft. But when SpaceX launched its first Falcon Heavy flight in February, Musk said the plans had changed and SpaceX would not be pursuing a crewed version of the Falcon Heavy rocket. [The Evolution of SpaceX’s Rockets in Pictures]
Instead, the company would focus on the WCR for future flights. In May, SpaceX confirmed that it will not fly its passenger flight this year to the Washington Post.
However, the BFR still has a long way to go before it can launch its passenger around the moon.
Musk said the crewed spacecraft could potentially start unsupervised suborbital test hops on the SpaceX grounds in Texas in 2019. The company could base these tests on its newest site near Brownsville, Texas. failure, Musk said.
And of course, SpaceX has yet to build the BFR. Earlier this year, the company signed an agreement with the Port of Los Angeles to build a construction facility for its BFR rockets.
But who will fly the first BFR passenger flight around the moon? And how has the design of the huge spaceship changed since last year? It will be necessary to wait tonight to find them.
Visit Space.com tonight for a full coverage of the BF SpaceX Moon Announcement.
Email Tariq Malik at [email protected] or follow him @ tariqjmalik. follow us @ Spacedotcom, Facebook and Google+. Original article on Space.com.
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