Via an X post in February, Elon Musk responded to Tesla Owners Silicone Valley by saying that his company was mapping out a plan to take a million people to Mars. Musk, 53, is the C.E.O of Space X, world’s most vibrant space exploration company. Back in 2022, a documentary titled Return to Space elaborated Musk’s mission for creating colonies in Mars, moon and other planets that can sustain life He was so passionate about it that at one point, when Neil Armstrong and co denigrated his space exploration proposals that were approved by former president Barack Obama, he descended into tears. Neil Armstrong, for starters was the first ever astronaut to successfully land in moon and back to earth in 1969, before the calamitous events of 1986, when the Challenger exploded half-way to space. Similar incident occurred in 2003, when Space Shuttle Columbia disintegrated as it re-entered the atmosphere over Texas, Louisiana ending up to the death of all seven astronauts on board.
Since his takeover of Space X, however, the company has experienced a meteoric rise in the field, while Musk himself has had the freedom to exploit his dreams of providing alternatives for the fast rising global population. Ranking among world’s richest men, The Tesla C.E.O has, for a long time been vocal with his criticism of the modern day family planning methods. “Population collapse due to low birth rates is a much bigger risk to civilizations than global warming,” Musk has repeatedly shared on his X account, in what could inform his efforts to make humanity multi-planetary.
According to Return To Space, the goal at Space X is to establish colonies in Mars and have million people there by 2050. To him, there is no need to regulate birth rates, when we can seek external solutions to any resulting population challenges, like building colonies in other planets.
Back in 2021, Space X set the precedence by sending the first all civilian mission to orbit in a mission dubbed Inspiration4, which was funded by billionaire Jared Isaacman. Aboard the Space X Crew Dragon capsule dubbed Resilience were four non-professional astronauts representing the four pillars of support for St. Jude’s Children’s Research Hospital in Memphis, Tennessee: leadership, hope, generosity and prosperity. The success of this mission, regardless of it’s obviously unrelated objective was a motivation to Mr. Musk and his team and in 2022, he made statements on his aspirational dates for Starships earliest mars landing. It is reported that the earliest mission to Mars could be no earlier than 2029.
Early missions are to involve small fleets of starship spacecrafts funded by public-private partnerships, with SpaceX stating on several occasions their aspirational plans to build a crewed base on Mars for an extended surface presence, which it hopes will grow into a self-sufficient colony.
