SpaceX's Elon Musk talked about his goals for Mars as he engaged with fans on Twitter. Elon Musk is known to launch astronauts to the Moon and develop implants for brain-computer interfaces, and it seems like the SpaceX CEO's imagination has no bounds.
SpaceX's Elon Musk Wants City on Mars by 2050
SpaceX's Elon Musk has made his money firing satellites into the Earth's orbit, but his main goal has always been to go to Mars and have people live there, according to Express UK.
Musk has always maintained the purpose of his exploits in space is to make sure that humanity becomes a spacefaring civilization.
Musk has invested money and resources into his Starship program to create a fully reusable and interplanetary launch vehicle.
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Mars is the top candidate for an outpost because it is close, easy to reach, and its surface conditions are adequate for human exploration.
The SpaceX and Tesla CEO have now shared some insight into his plans for the Red Planet, telling his fans that the city on Mars could be completed by 2050.
SpaceX's Raptor Factory in Texas
On July 10, Musk was asked on Twitter about SpaceX's plans for a Raptor factory in South Texas. Raptors are engines used to power Starship, which is SpaceX's prototype rocket.
Musk said that SpaceX would be "breaking ground" with a second Raptor factory in Texas, and it will focus on producing Raptor 2 engines, while the branch in California will focus on orbital engines and experimental designs, according to Dallas Morning News.
A fan on Twitter asked Musk about the volume production he is aiming for and the number of Raptors he wants per year.
Musk then went on to say that SpaceX will pump out thousands of engines until 2022, which should be enough to build a fleet of spacecraft for Mars.
This is not the first time Musk has said that he can set up a city on Mars in 30 years. The billionaire has opened up about the project in the past, revealing his estimates for how much the Mars project will cost.
In 2018, Musk told his Twitter followers that building a city on Mars will cost around $100 million to $10 trillion. One of the challenges, he said, is the cost of shifting large quantities of cargo to the planet.
With very few resources, future Mars colonists will have to take building materials with them. Musk added that his plans to make humanity interplanetary would begin this year, according to Austin American Statesman.
Musk believes that putting humans on Mars will help preserve the human species in case a cosmic cataclysm will wipe us out.
Musk tweeted that about half of his money is intended to help Earth issues and help create a self-sustaining city on Mars to ensure the continuation of life in case Earth gets hit by a meteor or if World War 3 happens.
However, not everyone is convinced that Musk can pull it off, with one expert calling his goals "delusional."
Lord Martin Rees, one of the leading astrophysicists in the United Kindom, thinks that Musk's dream is dangerous and compared it to living on top of Mount Everest.
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Written by Sophie Webster