Musk Warns SpaceX Possibly Facing Bankruptcy

In a companywide email acquired by The Verge, Space Explored, and CNBC, CEO Elon Musk warned employees of engine concerns far worse than originally understood. “As we have dug into the issues following exiting prior senior management, they have unfortunately turned out to be far more severe than was reported. There is no way to sugarcoat this,” the email cautioned. “We need all hands on deck to recover from what is, quite frankly, a disaster.”

Musk’s messaging refers to the departure of former Vice President of Propulsion Will Heltsley, who left SpaceX last month after more than a decade with the company. Heltsley had reportedly been removed from Raptor engine development after not making sufficient headway on the project, and was replaced by Jacob McKenzie, who’d been with SpaceX for six years. Musk publicly stated that the second-generation Raptor engine was making some hopeful progress following Heltsley’s departure, but that a “complete design overhaul” would also be necessary.

Raptor is vital to the success of Starship, a supersized reusable rocket capable of carrying heavier payloads and reaching greater distances. Musk hopes to use Starship to take humans to the moon and to Mars. (Those familiar with Musk’s lofty goals know a significant chunk of his public identity relates to Mars travel.) Starship will require six Raptor engines on its own, while its first stage, known as the “Super Heavy,” will need 33. Musk was originally planning to launch Starship’s first orbital flight in January 2022, but this now looks very unlikely.

“The consequences for SpaceX if we can not get enough reliable Raptors made is that we then can’t fly Starship,” the CEO’s Black Friday email said. “We face a genuine risk of bankruptcy if we can’t achieve a Starship flight rate of at least once every two weeks next year.”

Musk tweeted a follow-up to the harrowing situation on Tuesday, saying few appreciate the magnitude of the Starship program and reiterating the goals of the Raptor project. Though SpaceX wasn’t necessarily headed toward bankruptcy, such a position wouldn’t be impossible for the company to find itself in, either. The tweets appear to have since been deleted.

Continue reading

Astronomers Detect Another Possible Exoplanet Right Next Door

A project called Near Earths in the Alpha Center Region (NEAR) has just spotted tantalizing signals that could point to a planet in the habitable zone of Alpha Centauri, which is a mere 4.37 light years away. That's right next door in astronomical terms.

Nvidia’s RTX 3080 Ti Possibly Pushed Back Until May, Ampere in Short Supply

Nvidia may have delayed the RTX 3080 Ti back to May, and Ampere GPUs are in short supply. Samsung's production woes may not have ended.

‘Impossible’ EmDrive Actually Is Impossible, Comprehensive Test Shows

The hypothetical EmDrive rocket engine threatened to upend what we knew about physics... if it worked. After the latest round of testing, we can say with a high degree of certainty that it doesn't.

More Mysterious Fast Radio Bursts Detected, With Possible Answer in Sight

These anomalous pulses of energy were discovered in 2007, and a new data set covering hundreds of FRBs is being made available. This could be the advancement that helps us understand FRBs once and for all.