How many times will Starship need to be refueled?

ELI5 why does Starship need to refuel up to 10 times in orbit before it can carry out a moon mission? : r/SpaceXLounge.

Can Starship make it to orbit?

SpaceX will try to fly a Starship to orbit for the first time early next year, if all goes according to plan. The company is targeting January or February for its first Starship orbital launch attempt, SpaceX founder and CEO Elon Musk said Wednesday (Nov. 17).

How long will it take a ship to get to Mars?

The trip to Mars will take about seven months and about 300 million miles (480 million kilometers). During that journey, engineers have several opportunities to adjust the spacecraft’s flight path, to make sure its speed and direction are best for arrival at Jezero Crater on Mars.

Can starship land on the moon?

Starship HLS is a lunar lander variant of the Starship spacecraft that will transfer astronauts from a lunar orbit to the surface of the Moon and back. A crewed flight will occur as part of the Artemis 3 mission in 2024 after an earlier uncrewed test flight successfully lands on the Moon and returns to NRHO.

Can Elon Musk reach the moon?

SpaceX and Tesla founder Elon Musk said his space company can be ready to go to the moon in the next three years. Musk said in a Saturday Twitter post responding to a question about the timeline that SpaceX’s lunar lander would be ready for its moon mission “probably sooner” than 2024.

How many tanker launches does it take to refuel a starship?

Instead, assuming each Starship tanker is able to deliver a full 150 tons of payload (propellant) into orbit after a few years of design maturation, Musk believes that it’s unlikely to take more than eight tanker launches to refuel the depot ship – or a total of ten launches including the depot and lander.

How many SpaceX launches will it take to land a starship?

In response to GAO revealing that SpaceX proposed as many as 16 launches – including 14 refuelings – spaced ~12 days apart for every Starship Moon lander mission, Musk says that a need for “16 flights is extremely unlikely.”

What happens to Starship after its main mission?

After its main mission is complete, it remains to be seen if Starship will have enough propellant left over to return to some kind of Earth orbit, where it could potentially be refueled and reused on future missions to the lunar surface. However, even if it were 16 flights with docking, this is not a problem.

Why did NASA choose Starship for propellant transfer demonstration?

NASA has selected Starship for a propellant transfer demonstration! Combining Starship’s rapid reusability with orbital refilling is critical to economically transporting large numbers of crew and cargo to the Moon and Mars https://t.co/a3EZIUoXR7 https://t.co/0YRkVHBrDI