Billioner's space race fizzles
As Branson, Musk & Bezos hit obstacles, experts say Elon has taken the lead
IT is not every billionaire who can watch his dream project literally incinerate — at a cost of some $67 million — and deem it an “exciting” launch.
But when SpaceX’s Starship rocket blew up after just four minutes in the sky on April 20, Elon Musk quickly tweeted, “Congrats @SpaceX team on an exciting test launch of Starship! Learned a lot for next test launch in a few months.”
But it may not happen that fast, especially with an expected FAA investigation.
“I’d say three months is optimistic,” Douglas Messier, managing editor of ParabolicArc, a website that covers commercial space, told The Post. “I think it will take longer.
“There was an issue of expectations. The original plan was to have Starship crash off the coast of Kauai after a 90-minute flight,” Messier added. “Elon lowered the expectations to getting off the launchpad, and it did, but it didn’t succeed the way it was originally intended to. Elon is very good at managing expectations.”
It’s just the latest setback in the high-flying billionaire space race.
Over at Blue Origin, the brainchild of Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, things have not been perfect either.
In September 2022, an unmanned New Shepard rocket blasted off — only for flames to shoot out the bottom. The abort system kicked in and the capsule parachuted to the sea.
There were no injuries and the problem was identified as an overheated rocket engine, but flights are currently grounded. It’s been reported that Blue Origin “hopes to return to flight soon.” There’s also the money issue. “Each program at Blue Origin is supposed to be bringing in as much as it spends,” Eric Berger, author of “Liftoff: Elon Musk and the Desperate Early Days that Launched SpaceX,” told The Post. “That is not happening.”
Earlier this month, Richard Branson’s satellite-launch company, Virgin Orbit — an affiliate to his space tourism firm, Virgin Galactic — went bankrupt after failing to secure funding.
“Branson is completely out of it,” said Berger, referring to serious space exploration. “Frankly, he was never a major player to begin with. Virgin Galactic is a tourism company. Virgin Orbit spent a lot of money developing a rocket that couldn’t go anywhere.”
Start of the race
At the beginning of the 21st century, Musk, Bezos and Branson all expressed grand ambitions to send rockets blasting off into space.
In 2021, Bezos, now 59, and Branson, 72, were in a very public rush to see who could fly to space first.
Branson initially won the race by nine days. He went 53 miles into the sky, passing what is recognized by the US as the boundary of space, in his Virgin Galactic VSS Unity on July 11, 2021.
Bezos followed suit on July 20 but
seemed to be ahead in the name game. Besides barrier-breaking female aviator Wally Funk, who flew with Bezos on the initial flight, Blue Origin later sent up celebs William Shatner and Michael Strahan. The vehicle cleared 62 miles, passing the Kármán Line, which the company described as “the internationally recognized boundary of space.”
A-listers reportedly waiting to fly with Virgin include Leonardo DiCaprio, Tom Hanks and Katy Perry.
K-pop star T.O.P and DJ Steve Aoki, along with Japanese billionaire Yusaku Maezawa, are said to be going to Mars with Musk and SpaceX.
But will any of them ever get off the ground?
Musk’s dream remains the most ambitious. He wants to colonize Mars.
Rand Simberg, space technology consultant and author of “Safe is Not an Option,” finds Musk’s desire to be particularly lofty. “Getting to Mars is only part of the problem. How do you live there? Nobody knows,” he said. “You need a lot of technology to not just survive but to thrive on another planet.”
Nonetheless, rocket-world insiders say, Musk seems to be winning the space race now — even after the launch failure.
Bezos, after all, has yet to put a serious rocket to the test. And partly bankrupt Branson has become a nonentity in this leg of the competition.
“Elon is much more driven than Jeff,” Simberg said. “Jeff has treated it as a hobby. Jeff was not in a hurry. He made the tortoise and hare analogy [about him and Musk]. Right now Elon is winning. The hare is way ahead and you won’t catch up.”
How Elon got ahead
According to Berger, “Bezos is putting $1 billion per year into his company. They are still working on New Glenn [a heavy-launch rocket]. It was supposed to launch in 2020. Now 2025 seems like a reasonable guess. By then, though, SpaceX will have launched many rockets [all reusable, allowing for multiple launches per day]. Blue Origin is behind now.”
Musk is not alone in seeing the bright side of his recent flop.
“I thought the launch was a successful failure,” Berger said. “They got good data of the vehicle getting off the pad. They flew for four minutes and got a lot of data there. It was successful.”
While Musk has dreams of colonizing Mars, Bezos has expressed a desire to build space colonies of his own. Long term, he anticipates “millions of people living and working in space.”
Branson continues to harbor hopes for space tourism.
Branson, who has only sent up the one tourism flight so far, had some good news on April 26.
Virgin Galactic’s VSS Unity, designed for sub-orbital operation, flew on its own for the first time since 2021, landing safely after nine minutes in flight.
According to Space News, later this year Virgin Galactic will resume service with members of the Italian Air Force.
“This is a deal they worked out with Italy to do microgravity experiments,” said Messier. “The Italians are paying.”
But, Messier added, it’s vital that Branson get more civilians into space soon.
“Then there are 800 people who have paid in advance,” Messier said. “[Virgin] started selling tickets in 2005. They have to deliver at some point.”
Musk, meanwhile, has apparently made Bezos “absolutely jealous” with the contracts he brings into SpaceX from commercial and government clients that pay to have satellites launched into space.
Messier believes the real space race hinges on whether or not the tortoise can actually catch up with the hare, as in the fable.
“When Bezos and Blue Origin finally get into space, there will be competition,” said Messier. “For now, though, SpaceX stands alone. It’s real competition is with China. China looks at Musk and imitates what he does. They put a lot of money and a lot of prestige into their program. Musk isn’t really in competition with the other two billionaires, right now. He’s in competition with China.”
Each program at Blue Origin is supposed to be bringing in as much as it spends. That is not happening. — Author Eric Berger on Jeff Bezos’ space company