Elon Musk’s Starship rocket was launched last month and it wasn’t considered exactly successful as it exploded very shortly after launching. Despite all this Musk still has a lot of hope and plans for his company SpaceX and its Starship rocket.
Musk recently opened up and talked about the pros and cons of the launch on April 20. Musk said he expects SpaceX to spend about $2 billion on the Starship rocket in 2023 without raising additional funding, according to CNBC. He used his subscribers-only Twitter Space to discuss the matter.
Michael Sheetz, a reporter from CNBC space, live-tweeted the discussion hosted by the Twitter CEO.
“We do not anticipate needing to raise funding … we don’t think we need to raise funding,” the SpaceX founder said, according to Sheetz.
Musk congratulated the SpaceX team on an “exciting test launch” after the mega-rocket exploded, writing in a tweet that he “learned a lot for next test launch in a few months.”
“The outcome was roughly in what I expected, and maybe slightly exceeding my expectations, but roughly what I expected, which is that we would get clear of the pad,” Musk told listeners on Saturday.
Musk also indicated on a proposed timeline in which he claims that Starship will reach orbit in 2023 with an 80% probability.
“I think close to 100% change of reaching orbit within 12 months,” he said.
Starship left the launchpad on April 20 shortly after which the 40-story mega-rocket’s engines sent debris flying in the air. Then, about 24 miles above the ground, the booster failed to separate, causing the rocket to fall and leaving the SpaceX team no choice but to destroy it in an explosion.
Musk has claimed that all damages done are small and will be quickly repaired. Since then, Musk has been optimistic and has had SpaceX working on multiple Starship prototypes.
“I thought the SpaceX team did amazing work,” he said. “This is certainly a candidate for the hardest technical problem done by humans.”