Tesla car now flying toward asteroid belt beyond Mars

Vice President Mike Pence is pouring cold water on the warming ties between North and South Korea just as the two still-warring countries are joining up to compete together in the Winter Olympics.

Making his way to Pyeong- chang to lead the U.S. delegation to Friday’s opening cere- monies, Pence has embarked on a set of symbolic visits designed to draw attention to the North’s terrible human rights record and nuclear aggression. With determined rhetoric — and the promise of more “aggressive” economic sanctions against the North — Pence is looking to refo- cus American allies on the North Korean threat.

“We will not allow North Korea to hide behind the Olympic banner the reality that they enslave their peo- ple and threaten the wider region,” Pence said Wednesday after meetings with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe in Tokyo.

Pence arrives in Seoul on Thursday for meetings with President Moon Jae-in just as South Korea seizes on the games for a diplomatic opening with the North, including the first visit of North Korea’s ruling family since the end of the 1950-53 Korean War. Aides say the vice president is advancing a counter mes- sage, using the games as an opportunity for the South and the broader international community to exert what President Donald Trump has termed “maximum pressure” against the North.

Before de p arting for Korea, Pence announced that the U.S. would unveil in coming days “the toughest and most aggressive round of economic sanctions on North Korea ever.”

Pence’s strenuous efforts to highlight the threat from the North and its human rights record present a dilemma for Moon. The South Korean leader has long advocated engagement with Pyong- yang and sees the Olympics as an opportunity to quell tensions that have escalated over its nuclear program. He has limited room to maneu- ver as his guest from Wash- ington strongly criticizes the North and emphasizes the need to crank up sure campaign.

U.S. officials declined to offer details on the expected new sanctions beyond Pence’s comments, citing concerns that any additional information could be used by those trying to skirt the new measures. They are expected to be implemented before the conclusion of the games.

North Korea already is facing unprecedented sanctions after three U.N. SecurityCoun- cil restrictions in thepast year that have slashed the pariah nation’s export revenue and capped fuel imports. Unilaterally, the U.S. has also targeted North Korean ship- ping companies and Chinese trading networks. A potential escalation of sanctions could be the U.S. blacklisting Chinese banks accused of providing North Korea access to the international financial system and facilitating sanc- tions evasion.

Administration officials said they had long expected the North would seek to use the Olympics, taking place just 50 miles from the heavily-mined demilitarized zone, as an opportunity to put a softer face on the regime, and painted Pence’s visit as a counterbalance to those efforts. At the same time, the vice president has delib- erately left the door open to a possible encounter with North Korean officials expected to be in attendance. the pres-

The world’s first space sports car is cruising toward the asteroid belt, well beyond Mars.

SpaceX chief Elon Musk confirmed the new, more distant route for his rocketing Tesla Roadster. The red electric convertible was the unorthodox cargo aboard his company’s brand new Falcon Heavy rocket during a test flight on Tuesday.

With the successful launch, the Heavy became the most powerful rocket flying today.

A nd Musk’s Roadster became the fastest car ever, hurtling off the planet and zooming away on a route that will now take it all the way to the asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter.

Late Tuesday, Musk said the final firing of the rock- et’s upper stage put his car on a more distant trajectory than anticipated. Not only is it headed toward Mars, but almost to the dwarf planet Ceres in the asteroid belt.

A mannequin dressed in a “real deal” SpaceX space- suit — dubbed “Starman” by Musk — is strapped in behind the car’s wheel. Usually test flights carry noth- ing of value, such as con- crete blocks. Musk found that “boring” and put his cherry-red Tesla on top. He’s in charge of the carmaker as well as the private space company.

Images of the exposed Roadster and “Starman” — named after a David Bowie song — against the backdrop of our blue planet, were burning up the internet long after Tuesday’s launch.

“I think it looks so ridicu- lous and impossible. You can tell it’s real because it looks so fake, honestly,” Musk said Tuesday night. “It’s still tripping me out.”

The Roadster is in an even more elongated orbit now

stretches from Earth on one end, all the way to the neighborhood of Ceres on the other. The original plan had the car traveling only as far as Mars, coming close to the red planet but hopefully nicking it. If it survives swarming asteroid belt, car and its occupant are expected to continue orbit

for millions if not billions of years.

Like so many others, NASA astronaut Ricky Arnold was awe-struck by the livestreaming of “Starman” and his ride.

is preparing for his own ride to the International

Station next month. “Perfect day for a cruise in a ragtop,” Arnold tweeted, offering congratulations to SpaceX. “Awesome! At this speed, two hands on the steering wheel please #Starman.”

And favorite launch pad.” The Heavy lifted off from the same spot as NASA’s now-retired but more powerful Saturn V moon rockets and space shuttles. The Heavy is a combo of three Falcon 9s, that SpaceX uses to ship space station supplies and launch satellites for its customers.

Mars is driving all of Musk’s space efforts.

Musk said he doesn’t plan to fly people on the Heavy — that will mainly be used to launch supersize satellites. But he’s accelerating development of an even bigger rocket for deep-space crews — “a beast.”

His overriding goal is to establish a city on Mars, sending people there in a flotilla of SpaceX spaceships launched by colossal SpaceX rockets. Before dashing off to the red planet, Musk said he’d want to try out this spaceship in orbit around Earth and then the moon.

At a news conference Tuesday night, Musk told report- ers that as early as next year, he may begin test flights of the mega spaceship in Texas. These short hops would take the ship several miles high and then come back down for a landing. It’s the landing part that’s especially hard, he noted, especially at the speed the craft will be traveling when it comes in for a touchdown on another planet.

Tuesday’s success of the Heavy provides a confidence boost to these futureplans, Musk said. Two of the three first-stage boosters flew back for side-by-side landings; the third was lost at sea.

Rocket recycling is the key to SpaceX’s launch cost-cutting strategy. The Falcon Heavy is price-listed at $90 million, a bargain in the business of rockets.

In the meantime, with the Heavy demo out of the way, Musk said SpaceX is putting its commercial crew effort for NASA front and center. He said the company is still on track to launch astronauts in a SpaceX Dragon capsule, aboard a Falcon 9 rocket, at the end of this year.

SpaceX is competing with Boeing to be the first to send Americans into orbit from U.S. soil again, something that hasn’t happened since NASA’s last shuttle flight. U.S. astronauts have been riding Russian rockets, costing taxpayers tens of millions of dollars a seat, to get to the space station since the shuttle program ended in 2011.