SpaceX to Send 5 Uncrewed Missions to Mars in Two Years

Elon Musk, Space X’s CEO, announced yesterday on X that the American aerospace company plans to launch around five uncrewed Starships to the planet Mars in two years.

“If those all land safely, then crewed missions are possible in four years,” wrote Musk. “If we encounter challenges, then the crewed missions will be postponed another two years.”

The CEO expanded more on his plan for the next few years to send humans to Mars. According to Reuters, Musk has mentioned this before and said that the first mission should happen in two years “when the next Earth-Mars transfer window opens.” In this recent post, he explains that it has to do with the nature of our solar system. “It is only possible to travel from Earth to Mars every two years when the planets are aligned,” stated Musk. “This increases the difficulty of the task, but also serves to immunize Mars from many catastrophic events on Earth.”

SpaceX is relying on its reusable model, Starship, to achieve the upcoming milestone. The company successfully tested the latest model system in June, after the first efforts failed and the rockets were destroyed.

Musk has also raised a political debate regarding the future of space missions. The CEO wrote that the current bureaucracy from the government of the United States is slowing down and affecting the missions and that he is concerned that Democratic party candidate Kamala Harris would not ease the process.

Last week, Musk also said that they are working on SpaceX “to offer travel to Mars to anyone who wants to go” and that the experience would be similar to a long sea voyage as it was centuries ago.