This Carbon Based Life

By David Glenn Cox

Call it the path of Elon. An electric truck with a 500-mile range for only $40,000. He’s going to revolutionize the entire truck business! Delivered an electric truck with a 300-mile range on a pretty day with almost zero towing capacity for 70 + thousand to 100,000 dollars, that rusts. Brother Elon has a habit of over-promising and under-delivering.

Remember? Hüsker Dü? Elon was going to build a city on Mars with a population of a million people. And the robots were going to do all the work. And robots would fix the broken-down robots and humanity would be relegated to just looking out the window in this merry Martian metropolis. But not for too long (radiation hazard) not more than ten or so minutes a day. Elon’s purpose was high and noble, and in retrospect, I think he more than doubled down on the high aspect.

Elon was going to expand humanity’s reach in the galaxy. Because that’s really important! Why, if you were a human being living on Mars and the Earth blew itself up. You’d appreciate Elon having the good sense to plan a backup destination. “Whew! That was close!” But outside of Star Trek, we can’t live on Mars. There’s no air. The atmosphere is instantly deadly toxic, and the prevailing temperatures are intolerable.

Elon’s gonna build this affordable spaceship for us. That “starship” name, how noble and majestic! Sure, it sounds over the top, like something a billionaire on a coke binge might have thought up. Expanding humanity’s reach in the galaxy! Yeah, sure! Why, Elon’s going to make space travel more affordable, not more than a quarter of a million dollars per trip one way. (children’s fares available upon request) NASA engineers looked at the plans for “starship” and suggested a program of random drug testing. Not 100 passengers, not more than twenty. The launch weight of the vehicle was 40% water. And the water made up 40% of the available payload. The numbers just don’t add up.

A funny story. Space X built launch pad number one. The first starship launch destroyed the launch pad completely and threw debris, and chunks of concrete over three hundred yards. The funny part? Remember that nerdy kid in high school, that nobody liked, but everyone copied off of, who picked his nose and talked to himself? That kid could tell you how to build a launch pad. You take the expected (figured to the third decimal point.) force of the engines and the distance from the launch pad. Plus, the expected tensile strength of the green concrete and the weight of the rocket. A nerdy high school kid with a Radio Shack calculator could have told you that launch pad was about to become toast. But somehow, it was a surprise! “Wow, we really didn’t expect that!”

It’s like, “Who is running this place?” This is mission 12, where we check out a new set of more powerful rocket engines. Were the old engine not powerful enough on the first eleven missions? No, they were just fine, but these are even better! You see, this is an ongoing research and development vehicle. That means, we don’t really have to accomplish much, as long as we learn something. Mission 12, on to orbit someday! And then, maybe someday, “a manned mission!”

I don’t want to be that way just to be that way, but Alan Shepard went into space on Mercury-Redstone – 3. Back when space travel was filled with many unknowns that are now well known and resolved. Mission 12, a sub-orbital flight where the booster crashes into the ocean and all booster info is lost? On mission 11, mother nature burned the  “starship’s” heat shield to a crispy critter. Like a hot dog that fell in the charcoal grill. Gee, you’d think they would want to know what happened to the mission 12 heatshield. But they launched satellites! Did you see that? Just like they do on rockets costing a third of that price.

I guess while we’re waiting in our parking orbit, waiting in our chairs 23 hours a day for a few weeks, for the 12  to 15 “starship” refueling missions to top off our fuel tanks before beginning the long mission. In the meantime, the least we can do is launch a few satellites to subsidize the cost of the mission, since we’re going there. Could you drop these off for me? Tonight’s movie! “Snakes on a Plane” starring Snoop Dog!

One issue NASA researchers picked on was a shortage of exercise machines. To barely stay alive on a ten-month mission to Mars would require at least one hour of physical exercise per day. 100 passengers would require many stationary bicycles. “Wake up! It’s 3:00 AM, it’s your hour on the bike!” Huh, what? Are we there yet?  

Then the vision is reframed as our mission is now the moon. We’re going to land a multi-ton space vehicle standing over a 150-foot tall on its end on the unprepared lunar surface. You know, like they predicted in all of those 1950s science fiction films, before we actually went to space. Even rocket scientists like Werner Von Braun had once considered it, before dismissing it. Who are you going to believe, Elon or Werner? Werner had never even dreamed of refueling missions.

Imagine you! In your new life’s career as a starship crane operator. Twelve degrees off of vertical with a heavy package to unload on unknown lunar soil conditions. What could possibly go wrong? That’s why Werner dismissed it as far too dangerous. Too many things to go wrong. The elevator breaks down, the rocket topples over or the door won’t open. (It happened)  During a billionaire’s cocaine binge, I suppose it all sounds plausible. Notice on 1969s Featured NASA lunar lander, four incredibly large and imposing legs, four big fucking landing legs, huge honking landing legs. Because Werner knew it’s really fucking dangerous out there. And you don’t half ass around and just assume it will all work out.

First Mars and then the moon. Now Elon is setting his cap for a new objective. Mission, Wall Street! Elon is merging all of his money losing ventures with the successful ones, and preparing his initial public offering. A 150-foot-tall rocket landing on unknown and unprepared surface. A 150-ton, payload on top of  a 150-foot-tall rocket landing on an unprepared surface? Excuse me If I don’t volunteer.

“For me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.” ― Carl Sagan