Who will make it to Mars first?
It was about a year ago that Boeing Chief Executive Dennis Muilenburg first began saying his company would beat SpaceX to Mars. "I'm convinced that the first person to step foot on Mars will arrive there riding on a Boeing rocket," he said during a Boeing-sponsored tech summit in Chicago in October 2016.
On Thursday, Muilenburg repeated that claim on CNBC. Moreover, he added this tidbit about the Space Launch System rocket—for which Boeing is the prime contractor of the core stage—"We're going to take a first test flight in 2019 and we're going to do a slingshot mission around the Moon."
Unlike last year, Muilenburg drew a response from SpaceX this time. The company's founder, Elon Musk, offered a pithy response on Twitter: "Do it."
The truth is that Boeing's rocket isn't going anywhere particularly fast. Although Muilenburg says it will launch in 2019, NASA has all but admitted that will not happen. The rocket's maiden launch has already slipped from late 2017 into "no earlier than" December 2019. However, NASA officials have said a 2019 launch is a "best case" scenario, and a slip to June 2020 is more likely.
#SLS2020
Also, the next SpaceX flight is an ISS resupply mission and is scheduled for this coming Tuesday (December 12, 2017) at 1646 GMT (11:46 a.m. EST) from SLC-40, Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida. The plan is for the booster to return to landing at Landing Zone-1, also at Cape Canaveral.
Previously: Maiden Flight of the Space Launch System Delayed to 2019
Elon Musk Publishes Mars Colonization Plan
SpaceX Appears to Have Pulled the Plug on its Red Dragon Plans
SpaceX Putting Red Dragon on the Back Burner
SpaceX: Making Human Life Multiplanetary
Related: VP of Engineering at United Launch Alliance Resigns over Comments About the Space Launch Industry
ULA Exec: SpaceX could be Grounded for 9-12 Months
Commercial Space Companies Want More Money From NASA
Bigelow and ULA to Put Inflatable Module in Orbit Around the Moon by 2022
SpaceX Unlocks "Steamroller" Achievement as Company Eyes 19 Launches in 2017
Trump Space Adviser: Mars "Too Ambitious" and SLS is a Strategic National Asset
SpaceX's Reusable Rockets Could End EU's Arianespace, and Other News
(Score: 3, Insightful) by DannyB on Monday December 11 2017, @03:11PM (6 children)
Did Boeing specify what condition the humans would be in when they arrived at mars?
Or even if they would be alive when launched from Earth?
Does Boeing understand the difference between innovation and sucking at the government teat while trying to come up with innovating new ways to suck even more money from the government?
If a lazy person with no education can cross the border and take your job, we need to upgrade your job skills.
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Monday December 11 2017, @04:19PM (5 children)
Well, one way they can get to Mars faster and easier is to eliminate the need for a landing craft, and also for any rocket propellant for slowing the ship to enter Mars orbit. Just aim the craft with humans at Mars and go full speed; at the end of the trip, there will be humans on Mars.
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Monday December 11 2017, @05:59PM (4 children)
And you will find volunteers for that.
Which is no way, shape or form, a comment on what they would leave behind...
(Score: 2) by turgid on Monday December 11 2017, @09:23PM (3 children)
Perhaps some loony billionaires would pay to be buried on Mars, or at least be dropped upon it in their coffins having already died?
I refuse to engage in a battle of wits with an unarmed opponent [wikipedia.org].
(Score: 3, Funny) by MostCynical on Monday December 11 2017, @10:29PM (2 children)
"Here is the launch container - you lie in this moulded foam"
"Where are the breathing apparatus and controls?"
"There is enough air for the mission"
"..and the controls?"
"You will not need any controls, the computer will ensure you arrive."
"I guess once you start doubting, there's no end to it." -Batou, Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex
(Score: 3, Funny) by bob_super on Monday December 11 2017, @10:41PM (1 child)
It is utterly unacceptable that Russia has been leading with a score of 3. I demand that we find 4 Proud Americans ready to die in space !
(Score: 2) by MostCynical on Monday December 11 2017, @10:54PM
Have we just scripted "Weekend at Bernie's 3"?
"I guess once you start doubting, there's no end to it." -Batou, Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex