Elon Musk plans to launch SpaceX Starship Rocket on April 20th

The test flight of SpaceX’s much-anticipated Starship rocket — eventually en route to the Moon and Mars — has been pushed back from its original launch date on Monday to a new day: April 20.

The rocket remains on the launch pad in Cameron County, Texas, about 17 miles east of Brownsville while engineers prime the rocket’s pressure system, which unexpectedly froze. “A pressure valve appears to be frozen, so no launch today unless it comes online soon,” Musk initially tweeted Monday.

“SpaceX is targeting the first flight test of a fully integrated spacecraft and super-heavy rocket from Starbase in Texas as early as Thursday, April 20,” the company wrote. “The 62-minute launch window opens at 8:28 am CT and closes at 9:30 am CT.” The fact that it will launch on April 20 is “perhaps inevitable,” Musk tweeted in response to the announcement .

What makes Starship unique is its fully reusable transport system, designed to launch both crew and cargo into Earth orbit. Musk and the SpaceX team believe that humanity will return to the moon and travel to Mars. This particular test will help SpaceX improve the probability of success in the future.

“To date, the SpaceX team has conducted multiple suborbital flight tests of Starship’s upper stage from Starbase and successfully demonstrated an unprecedented approach to controlled flight,” SpaceX wrote. “These flight tests helped validate the vehicle’s design and proved that Starship can fly through the subsonic phase of entry before reigniting its engines and rotating into a vertical configuration for landing.”

SpaceX explained why there are so many factors that can delay a space flight.

“In addition to testing Starship’s upper stage, the team conducted numerous tests of the Super Heavy rocket, including the increasingly complex static burns that resulted in a 31 Raptor engine test over its entire duration – the largest number of simultaneous rocket engine firings in the Story. The team also built the world’s tallest rocket launch and containment tower. At 146 meters or nearly 500 feet tall, the launch and capture tower is designed to aid in vehicle integration, launch and capture of the Super Heavy rocket booster. For the first flight test, the team will not attempt a vertical landing of the spacecraft or a catch of the Super Heavy Booster.”

A live webcast of the flight test begins approximately 45 minutes before launch. As with many space-related launches, this schedule is dynamic and likely to change.

“On the next try on Thursday, the super heavy booster will detach and then splatter hard about eight minutes after takeoff in the Gulf of Mexico. Starship’s upper stage spacecraft will make a partial orbit around the Earth and land in the Pacific Ocean near Hawaii approximately 90 minutes after launch,” the report reads.

Is the date 20.04. significant? Probably, considering Musk has been in the spotlight for the past five years: On August 7, 2018, Musk tweeted that he was considering taking Tesla private, citing a price of $420 per share for the acquisition.

I’m considering taking Tesla private for $420. financing secured.

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) August 7, 2018

He told the New York Times that he knows how popular weed is, but he’s not sure how it might increase productivity, to be honest. “There seemed to be better karma at $420 than at $419,” Musk said. “But I wasn’t on weed, to be blunt.” That changed a month later during a podcast appearance on The Joe Rogan Experience.

On September 6, 2018, Musk smoked a blunt on episode #1169 of The Joe Rogan Experience. Rogan himself became embroiled in the free speech issue over his Spotify fiasco over concerns that the podcaster was sharing information that wasn’t medically sound.