Elon Musk Just Unveiled SpaceX 2.0

What's This?

Elon Musk unveils the SpaceX Dragon V2 on May 29.

Image: SpaceX

By Chris Taylor2014-05-30 03:30:49 UTC

Tesla, SpaceX, Solar City, the Hyperloop: Elon Musk is renowned for having more futuristic ideas than he knows what to do with. But what Musk unveiled Thursday night at SpaceX may yet rank as his greatest leap forward: the world's first commercial, reusable manned spacecraft.

The Dragon V2, as it's known, looks a little like the LEM unit NASA used to use in Apollo missions. But this isn't your father's lunar lander, because of one feature designed to quicken the hearts of space geeks everywhere: it can land vertically back on Earth — using retro rockets to give it "the accuracy of a helicopter," Musk said. (And with parachutes as built-in back up, he hastily added).

See also: You're Cleared for Blast-Off: Virgin Galactic Gets FAA Approval

That helps clear one of the biggest hurdles on the way to a proper space exploration industry: the ability to use the spacecraft again. As Musk put it: "imagine if aircraft were thrown away after each flight. No one could afford to fly." The SpaceX founder claims the Dragon V2 capsule could be refueled and ready to go back into space again that same day.

Everything about the Dragon V2 launch event (which you can watch in its entirety above) screamed "we live in the future", Musk's stilted and nervous delivery notwithstanding. A video simulation of the craft flying to the International Space Station — where Musk's Falcon rockets already have a contract to deliver cargo, and where a prior version of the Dragon was successfully sent as a test — showed a detachable rocket base covered in solar panels.

And when Musk stepped inside the craft, sitting in one of the seven seats designed for human passengers, we got our first look at a gleaming 21st century spacecraft, with large touchscreens instead of instrument panels. Call it the Tesla of space.

Seven astronauts — that's as many as the Space Shuttle carried, and as Space.com points out, twice the capacity of the Russian Soyuz craft. Which is a good thing, because NASA is dependent on the Soyuz system, and is having something of a dispute with the Russian space agency right now, for obvious reasons. The Russian deputy prime minister famously told the US last month it could use trampolines instead.

That dispute was evidently the reason for Musk's timing in unveiling the Dragon V2:

SpaceX is presenting the Dragon V2 to NASA as a Soyuz replacement; no word yet on when a decision will be reached.

But Musk isn't hanging around. His next step in the conquest of space, believe it or not: mouse astronauts.

Topics: elon musk, Space, SpaceX, SpaceX Dragon, US & World