8:53 a.m. ET, April 17, 2023
What's riding on the SpaceX Starship launch
From CNN's Jackie Wattles
An American flag waves in the wind as the SpaceX Starship stands on the launch pad ahead of the flight test on Sunday, April 16.
(Patrick T. Fallon/AFP/Getty Images)
Just a few months after NASA introduced the world to the most powerful rocket ever flown to orbit,
Elon Musk’s SpaceX is prepared to set off its own creation — which could pack nearly twice the power of anything flown before.
"I guess I'd like to just set expectations low," SpaceX CEO Elon Musk said during a Twitter "Spaces" event for his subscribers Sunday evening.
If we get far enough away from the launch pad before something goes wrong, then I think I would consider that to be a success. Just don't blow up the pad.
Starship's ultimate success or failure is immensely consequential. Not only is it crucial to SpaceX's future as a company, it also underpins the United States government's ambitions for human exploration.
NASA has awarded SpaceX contracts and options worth several
billions of dollars to use Starship to ferry government astronauts to the surface of the moon under the space agency’s
Artemis program.
But it's not all riding on this inaugural test flight. SpaceX has long established its willingness to embrace mishaps, mistakes and explosions in the name of refining the design of its spacecraft.
In the lead-up to the first launch of the company's
Falcon Heavy rocket in 2018, which held the title of the most powerful rocket before NASA's SLS took flight last year, Musk foresaw only a 50-50 chance of success.
"People [came] from all around the world to see what will either be a great rocket launch or the best fireworks display they've ever seen," Musk told CNN at the time.
The Falcon Heavy launch was ultimately successful.