Elon Musk unveils radical 'megashuttle' that will take man to Red Planet in 80 days to set up a million person city - but warns the first trips will be 'really very dangerous'
SpaceX chief Elon Musk has unveiled his most ambitious project yet - an 'interplanetary transport system' to take man to Mars in 80 days and build a sustainable human colony of a million people there.'What I want to achieve is make Mars seem possible, to show that we can do it in our lifetimes, and you could go,' he said at the International Astronautical Congress in Mexico.However, he warned the trip was likely to be dangerous - and said candidates for the first missions 'must be prepared to die'.
Tesla Motors CEO Elon Musk speaks about the Interplanetary Transport System which aims to
reach Mars with the first human crew in history
The Interplanetary Transport System will use a giant shuttle capable of carrying 100 passenger to the Red Planet at a time, and Musk hopes to take a million people to set up a sustainable city there. It will launch from Earth on a giant version of SpaceX's reusable rocket booster, unfurling solar sails to power its journey to the red planet.
'I think the first journeys to Mars will be really very dangerous,' said Musk.
'The risk of fatality will be high. There's just no way around it.'
'Are you prepared to die? If that's okay, then you're a candidate for going,' he added.
He also said he wouldn't be vying to be the first man on Mars.
'The risk of death would be quite high, and I'd like to watch my kids grow up.'
He admitted he would take the trip - one day.
'I'd definitely like to go to orbit, visit the space station and ultimately go to Mars,' he said.
'I'd need to make sure if something goes wrong there's a succession plan in place - investors taking over the company would be my biggest fear.'
'This is less about who goes there first.
'The thing that really matters is making a self-sustaining civilization on Mars as fast as possible. This is different than Apollo.
'This is really about minimizing existential risk and having a tremendous sense of adventure,' he said.
Musk outlined plans for a fleet of large 'megashuttles' that would take 100 people at a time to Mars for $200,000 a trip, after warning 'eventually history suggest there will be some extinction event on Earth'.
'One path is we stay on earth forever and there will be some eventual extinction event. I don't have a doomsday prophesy,' he said.
'We can grow plants on Mars by compressing the atmosphere.
'It would be fun there, as gravity is a third of what it is on Earth.'
The Interplanetary Transport System will use a giant rocket booster with a 12m diameter, and a special shuttle with a 17m diameter, making the entire rocket stack 122 m high, Musk said.
It will have 49 Raptor engines, and Musk hopes the first test craft could fly in just four years.
'Trip time can be as low as 80 days, ultimately we can cut that to 30 days in the not too distant future.'
Musk also promised the craft would have restaurants and zero gravity games to make the trip bearable.
'It will be fun, you'll want to go' he said.
'We need to go from these exploration missions to building a city,' he said.
He also pledged to make the price of a trip to Mars the same price as a house - $200,000.
'As we show this is possible, I think the support will snowball over time, and the main reason I'm accumulating assets is to fund this.'
He also claimed the two planets were similar.
'They are remarkably close in a lot of ways.
'We now believe that early mars is a lot like earth. And if we could warm Mars up we could once again have a thick atmosphere and liquid oceans
'Decent sunlight, a little cold, but we can warm it up.
'It has a very helpful atmosphere, it means that we can grow plants on Mars just by compressing the atmosphere.'
Musk also admitted the system could be used to deliver cargo.
'We could transport cargo to anywhere on earth in 45 minutes, and most places would be 20-25 minutes, maybe if we had a floating platform outside of New York, for instance - you could cross the Atlantic in ten minutes.'
'If things go super well, we could go to Mars within a ten year timeline, we will do our best.'
The giant rockets will launch from Cape Canaveral, then release the capsule once in orbit, where it will 'park' while waiting for a refuel for the trip to Mars.
The giant rockets will launch from Cape Canaveral, then release the capsule once in orbit, where it will 'park' while waiting for a refuel for the trip to Mars.
It will then return to Earth to pick up a fuel tank for the shuttle, saving money on the launch - and launch again to rendezvous with the shuttle again.
It will repeat this process 3-5 times to refill the fuel tanks and take cargo.
Once on Mars, the shuttle will make methane for its return journey.
On the way to Mars, solar panels will deploy to create energy for the shuttle, taking it to the red planet at a speed of just over 100,000km/h.
It will glide to the red planet's surface, landing horizontally allowing for an easy relaunch once enough fuel has been made.
'What the video shows it what we will build,' Musk said.
'This is not what it might look like, this is what it will look like,' Musk said.
SpaceX chief Elon Musk has unveiled his most ambitious project yet - an 'interplanetary transport system' to take man to Mars in 80 days and build a sustainable human colony of a million people there.'What I want to achieve is make Mars seem possible, to show that we can do it in our lifetimes, and you could go,' he said at the International Astronautical Congress in Mexico.However, he warned the trip was likely to be dangerous - and said candidates for the first missions 'must be prepared to die'.
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| SpaceX CEO Elon Musk unveils his plans to colonize Mars during the International Astronautical Congress in Guadalajara, Mexic |
Tesla Motors CEO Elon Musk speaks about the Interplanetary Transport System which aims to
reach Mars with the first human crew in history
The Interplanetary Transport System will use a giant shuttle capable of carrying 100 passenger to the Red Planet at a time, and Musk hopes to take a million people to set up a sustainable city there. It will launch from Earth on a giant version of SpaceX's reusable rocket booster, unfurling solar sails to power its journey to the red planet.
'I think the first journeys to Mars will be really very dangerous,' said Musk.
'The risk of fatality will be high. There's just no way around it.'
'Are you prepared to die? If that's okay, then you're a candidate for going,' he added.
He also said he wouldn't be vying to be the first man on Mars.
'The risk of death would be quite high, and I'd like to watch my kids grow up.'
He admitted he would take the trip - one day.
'I'd definitely like to go to orbit, visit the space station and ultimately go to Mars,' he said.
'I'd need to make sure if something goes wrong there's a succession plan in place - investors taking over the company would be my biggest fear.'
'This is less about who goes there first.
'The thing that really matters is making a self-sustaining civilization on Mars as fast as possible. This is different than Apollo.
'This is really about minimizing existential risk and having a tremendous sense of adventure,' he said.
Musk outlined plans for a fleet of large 'megashuttles' that would take 100 people at a time to Mars for $200,000 a trip, after warning 'eventually history suggest there will be some extinction event on Earth'.
'One path is we stay on earth forever and there will be some eventual extinction event. I don't have a doomsday prophesy,' he said.
The other is to become a spacefaring and mutiplanetary species, which I think some would say is the right way to go - that's what we want.'
He hopes to set up a self sustaining city on the red planet with a million people.
'It will not be an outpost, but will become a city in its own right.'
He explained that there were no real options other than Mars.
'We can grow plants on Mars by compressing the atmosphere.
'It would be fun there, as gravity is a third of what it is on Earth.'
The Interplanetary Transport System will use a giant rocket booster with a 12m diameter, and a special shuttle with a 17m diameter, making the entire rocket stack 122 m high, Musk said.
It will have 49 Raptor engines, and Musk hopes the first test craft could fly in just four years.
'Trip time can be as low as 80 days, ultimately we can cut that to 30 days in the not too distant future.'
Musk also promised the craft would have restaurants and zero gravity games to make the trip bearable.
'It will be fun, you'll want to go' he said.
'We need to go from these exploration missions to building a city,' he said.
He also pledged to make the price of a trip to Mars the same price as a house - $200,000.
 |
| The capsule will launch from Earth aboard a huge rocket with over 29m lb of thrust. Once out of the Earth's atmosphere, it will separate and land back on earth. |
'
'Ultimate we think this could drop to $100,000.''Obviously it will be a challenge to fund this,' Musk admitted. 'It will be a public/private partnership, that's how the United States was funded,' he said.'As we show this is possible, I think the support will snowball over time, and the main reason I'm accumulating assets is to fund this.'
He also claimed the two planets were similar.
'They are remarkably close in a lot of ways.
'We now believe that early mars is a lot like earth. And if we could warm Mars up we could once again have a thick atmosphere and liquid oceans
'Decent sunlight, a little cold, but we can warm it up.
'It has a very helpful atmosphere, it means that we can grow plants on Mars just by compressing the atmosphere.'
Musk also admitted the system could be used to deliver cargo.
'We could transport cargo to anywhere on earth in 45 minutes, and most places would be 20-25 minutes, maybe if we had a floating platform outside of New York, for instance - you could cross the Atlantic in ten minutes.'
'If things go super well, we could go to Mars within a ten year timeline, we will do our best.'
The giant rockets will launch from Cape Canaveral, then release the capsule once in orbit, where it will 'park' while waiting for a refuel for the trip to Mars.
The giant rockets will launch from Cape Canaveral, then release the capsule once in orbit, where it will 'park' while waiting for a refuel for the trip to Mars.
It will then return to Earth to pick up a fuel tank for the shuttle, saving money on the launch - and launch again to rendezvous with the shuttle again.
It will repeat this process 3-5 times to refill the fuel tanks and take cargo.
Once on Mars, the shuttle will make methane for its return journey.
On the way to Mars, solar panels will deploy to create energy for the shuttle, taking it to the red planet at a speed of just over 100,000km/h.
It will glide to the red planet's surface, landing horizontally allowing for an easy relaunch once enough fuel has been made.
'What the video shows it what we will build,' Musk said.
'This is not what it might look like, this is what it will look like,' Musk said.
He plans to send fleets of the craft to the red planet and back to Earth.
His eagerly anticipated presentation, titled 'Making Humans a Multiplanetary Species' at the International Astronautical Congress in the western Mexican city of Guadalajara, proved so popular its start was delayed to fit more people in. When asked if he was planning a toilet, Musk said 'the main thing about Mars will be energy, there's plenty of water, its about getting solar panels out there.'He was also asked who the first visitors should be.
'The first journeys will be very dangerous, so I wouldn't suggest sending children - people would have to be prepared to die to be a candidate.This is less about who goes there first, its about making a self sustaining civilization on Mars as soon as possible.'
He also addressed safety fears.'There's some risk of radiation, buts its not deadly,' Musk said.'You need to have some shielding from solar flares, over time you could construct an artificial magnetic field to deflect them.'He also admitted he had no plans to build the city.
'The goal of SpaceX is to build the transport system, once that's built there is a tremendous opportunity to create something new, to build everything from iron refineries to the first pizza joint.'Our goal is to get you there.'It's also important to give people the option to come back, Musk said.'In any case, we need the spaceship back - you get a free return trip if you want it. 'On Earth, you can go anywhere in 24 hours. There's no physical frontier any more - space is that frontier.' Musk also said he hoped anyone would be able to take the trip.
'You'll maybe need a few days of training,' he said.
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