Elon Musk sees Starship as primarily a Mars ship, with plans for a fleet of Starships transporting settlers to the red planet. Developed by SpaceX, Starship is designed to be the largest and most powerful rocket system ever created. Standing at 397 feet tall, it surpasses the Statue of Liberty in height.
The Super Heavy booster, which supports the Starship rocket, boasts 33 powerful Raptor engines that generate an impressive 16 million pounds of thrust at full throttle. This is a significant increase compared to NASA’s Space Launch System rocket, which currently holds the record for maximum thrust at 8.8 million pounds.
One standout feature of Starship is its reusability. Both the Super Heavy booster and Starship itself are designed to land back on Earth, allowing for the reuse of key components such as the Raptor engines. This reusability has the potential to significantly reduce the cost of launching payloads into orbit, with Musk predicting it could be as low as $10 million for 100 tons.
To withstand the extreme heat of re-entry into Earth’s atmosphere, Starship is adorned with black tiles on one side while being primarily constructed from stainless steel, a cost-effective alternative to materials like carbon composites. With its groundbreaking design and capabilities, Starship represents a major advancement in space travel technology.
