Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, announced this Monday (May 31), which is building a floating spaceport in the ocean off the coast of Texas, USA. The platform can serve as a base for launching and landing the agency's rockets on multiple rocket-to-space missions. These missions may include the likes of the Falcon 9, which has already launched hundreds of Starlink satellites into orbit.
For development, SpaceX purchased two oil rigs worth about $3,5 million and renamed the structures "Deimos" and "Phobos" after the moons of Mars. Let's assume that the Red Planet is the main target set by the space agency. According to Musk's company, several current projects will benefit from floating spaceports. The platform is located within easy reach of major world hubs, allowing the agency to operate a superfast travel network using starships to transport people.
Ocean spaceport Deimos is under construction for launch next year https://t.co/WJQka399c7
- Elon Musk (@elonmusk) May 30, 2021
In addition to intercontinental travel, interplanetary missions are mentioned as anticipating multimillion-dollar investments applied to platforms. It is believed that "Deimos" and "Phobos" will become functional by the end of 2021. With the Starship series of spacecraft, they are expected to carry out manned missions to the planet Mars much sooner than expected.
SpaceX successfully landed its Starship Sn15 rocket earlier this month
So far, the Starship SN15 rocket has successfully landed and shown promise for manned travel, prompting SpaceX to take an optimistic view and project missions to the Red Planet by 2024. At its base in Texas, USA, SpaceX conducted a flight test that lifts the spacecraft to a height of 10 km and returns it to a horizontal orientation. When it is close to the ground, the rockets are activated to change the position of the ship to vertical and land it safely with a smooth impact. And that's exactly what happened.
After the "failures" of SN4, SN8, SN10 and S11 prototypes, which were useful for improving the test carried out in May, humanity is now a little closer to the first flights to Mars, which is the goal of SpaceX's Starship development.
It's worth noting that SpaceX certainly has some very interesting plans for its new spaceport. In addition to these very complex plans, the company can also improve what has already been created. The new spaceport could improve the placement of satellites that power the Starlink Internet service. The company's network should continue to grow exponentially in the coming years.
