Elon Musk is going to announce the name of first private passenger to fly around the Moon aboard the BFR
Today, on 17 September, at 6 p.m. Pacific Standard Time, the founder of SpaceX Elon Musk is going to announce the name of the first passenger to fly around the Moon aboard the Big Falcon Rocket (BFR) launch vehicle. The timing of the flight is yet unknown.
SpaceX will broadcast the event, present the updated look of the BFR and, perhaps, disclose more details of the “lunar voyage”.
BFR is a new two-part launch system designed to eventually complete Musk’s main project — human travel to Mars. But even a year ago, while showcasing the BFR at the 68th International Astronautical Congress in Adelaide , Australia (September 2017), the head of SpaceX discussed that the spacecraft can be used for Moon exploration, as well as hypersonic long-distance travel on Earth.
A cutaway drawing that imagines the inside of Big Falcon Spaceship. SpaceX plans to build and use the vehicle for the first crewed Mars missions. Copyright of Nick Oberg
There are three variants of the rocket’s second stage planned: a Spaceship, Tanker and Cargo Lifter. The primary of which, the BFR spaceship, was also the colonization vehicle that could carry up to 100 passengers and a hundred tonnes of cargo. One possible use of the spaceship was as the hypersonic passenger transport vehicle, which enables travelling between any two points on Earth in under an hour. Its primary envisioned mission, however, was to be a colonization vehicle for the Moon, Mars and beyond.
As of 2018, a new production facility to build the vehicles is under construction in the Port of Los Angeles. Manufacture of the first ship was underway by March 2018, with first suborbital test flights planned for 2019. The company publicly stated an aspirational goal for initial Mars-bound cargo flights of BFR launching as early as 2022, followed by the first crewed flight to Mars one synodic period later, in 2024.
SpaceX plans to replace the existing rockets and space transportation systems by the BFR in the early 2020s. According to SpaceX, BFR launches will be less costly than its precedents. In case of success, BFR will replace the Falcon 9, Falcon Heavy and the Dragon.
Today’s model BFR (2017, 4th to the left) and ITS (2016, 5th to the left) compared to other USA rockets. Autor: Thorenn. CC BY-SA 4.0
In February 2017, SpaceX announced that it has signed a contract with two space tourists.
They were supposed to fly into space at the end of 2018 on the Dragon 2 spacecraft with the aid of the Falcon Heavy launch vehicle. The week-long mission was delayed until 2019. Now it is planned that the new space passenger will fly around the Moon without landing and return to Earth on the BFR. Depending on the Moon’s position, this tourist’s flight will cover approximately 480,000–640,000 kilometres.
Regardless of the ambitiousness of Musk’s announced plans, there are a number of questions regarding the BFR project that remain unanswered by SpaceX:
- How realistic are the announced dates? On the one hand, there has been a talk about а suborbital flight in 2019 and even flights to the Moon in a few years, but on the other, there are no specific dates regarding Moon flights. It is possible that something will be announced today. Regardless, how exactly Musk plans to achieve such grandiose plans in such a short period of time remains unclear.
-It is also unclear where the resources for building the BFR will come from. Musk says he is going to focus the majority of SpaceX’s resources on the project and “cannibalise” its Falcon rockets. However, it seems that that may be insufficient.
- And, of course, there are safety concerns regarding the BFR flight for the future lunar tourist and for the passengers of the suborbital flight — not to mention the Mars expedition. Earlier, Musk has admitted that the first flights will be dangerous.
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