Boys and their Toys

 

by Pa Rock

Citizen Journalist

Stories about giant rockets rattling the Earth and destroying ecosystems as they roar off to the heavens are becoming more commonplace, and today two are in the news - and both are projects funded and operated by private companies which are under the control of two of America's richest oligarchs.  

Billionaire Elon Musk, the owner of SpaceX, is hopeful that his enormous (403-foot) SpaceX Starship will take flight from his launch facility on the Texas coast at 5:00 p.m. today for what will be its seventh flight since 2023.  It won't be in space long and today's flight is simply one more trial run.   Starship, currently the biggest rocket ever built, is an integral part of Elon's master plan of reaching Mars within the next couple of years with human passengers.

It is unlikely that Elon will be one of those passengers.

Billionaire Jeff Bezos, the owner of spaceflight company Blue Origin, has been into space aboard one of his rockets, a brief sojourn into the heavens in which his brother and a couple of paying tourists joined him for a joyride.    Bezos now has a new giant rocket which he tried to launch two days ago, but the mission was delayed because of ice on some of the wiring.  There will be another attempt to launch the New Glenn tomorrow.   At  a mere 320 feet in height the New Glenn appears less potent than Musk's Starship, but a more accurate comparison will certainly be made if and when Bezos gets it up.

For anyone interested in space flight to the degree that they would like to have their own rocket, a 13.77-inch (1/375) Diecast Model of Musk's SpaceX Starship is available through Amazon.com, a Bezos company, for just $47.99.  What a deal!  Get yours today before the mail-order gang at Mar-a-Lago begins selling them with a presidential seal for a "slightly" higher amount!

Occupy Mars, one billionaire at a time - and then leave them there!