Important Innovations Collection

SpaceX Starlink Source:  SpaceX Starlink 600 Internet Satellites and Counting SpaceX and founder/CEO Elon Musk are setting new records in building Starlink, the space-based global internet service.  SpaceX is manufacturing an unprecedented 120 internet satellites per month.  No satellite competitor has even come close.  600 Starlink satellites are now in low Earth orbit.  Musk recently told the FCC that he plans to build an interconnected network of 12,000 small satellites capable of beaming high speed internet to anyplace in the world. Big Investment Musk told the FCC that he has invested hundreds of millions of dollars in Starlink thus far.  He is currently producing thousands of consumer user terminals per month and is building ground stations to directly connect consumers to the Starlink network.  Musk says his internet service will be "inexpensive" for consumers to purchase. Big Demand Last week, SpaceX informed the FCC that it is experiencing "ex...

SpaceX Launching Experimental Mars Rocket Prototype Source:  Space X "Hop Tests Of Starship" SpaceX CEO Elon Musk has plans to colonize Mars.  To take the new colonists, you and I who choose to go there, he's working on an experimental rocket prototype and has been launching it on what he calls "hop tests".  The vehicle is called SN5 and doesn't look like a rocket.  It looks like a large, steel silo with a rocket strapped underneath.  It's been launched to 500 feet and landed with success in late summer 2020 in south Texas.  This prototype is designed to help SpaceX precisely launch and land a huge spacecraft with spot-on accuracy from the Earth to other planets. Starship to Mars SpaceX is accelerating the development of a massive spacecraft and rocket system called Starship which the CEO hopes will carry the first humans to Mars.  He tested a series of prototypes including Starhopper several times in 2019 with some successes and failures. Musk has spe...