Can starship get to mars by 2024

Illustration of starship launching from mars(credit-spacex)

Can starship really make it to mars with crew  in 2024 ?this is the question we all have atleast thats what we are expecting. To make this a reality spacex is really pushing the limits of rapid development, they are quickly testing prototypes one by one to make that timeframe a reality but recent failures of starship prototypes has raised questions on reaching mars by 2024.If you have missed watching closely the starship development this article will give you a complete rundown on starship development from start till now and what can we expect in future so tie up your seatbelts.

 • WHAT  WHAT WHAT SPACEX HAS ACHIEVED TILL NOW

On august 28 ,2019 spacex attempted the first ever flight of starhopper a shorter size water tower looking rocket prototype made of stainless steel ,it reached an altitude of 150 m and landed back on landing pad slightly away from where it was launched ,it became the first ever flight of a rocket with a full flow combustion cycle engine -The raptor which is the first methane powered engine to leave the test stand and took to the skies.

Starhopper 150 m flight(credit-spacex)

After completing that flight 2 starships were almost ready one in boca chica and one in florida that were expected to do a flight of 20km in 2-3 months but unfortunately fate was not with us, starship mk1 blew up and mk 2 was also retired ,spacex build and tested a lot of prototypes after that.

•TEST TANK 1-also known as bopper 1, it was tested to 7.1 bar  which is 1.1 bar more than pressure required for orbital flight

•TEST TANK 2- also known as bopper 2,it successfully managed to reached 8.5 bar before bursting which is 125% factor of safety required for crewed flights.

•Starship sn 1-this starship prototype was also destroyed during pressure testing which happened because of weak thrust puck weld.

•Sn2 -it was built to test the thrust puck to dome weld to overcome with the problem that sn 1 suffered.

•starship sn 3-This starship prototype was also destroyed this time not because of bad welds or bad design but because of human errors which caused it to crumple under its own weight and weight of liquid nitrogen in its methane tank.

•starship sn 4- this is the most successful starship prototype so far it had successfully done 5 static fires after which it exploded recently.According to elon they were doing a quick disconnect test which after going wrong took the life on sn 4.

•WHAT SPACEX IS DOING NOW TO MEET THE TIMEFRAME OF 2024

After so many failures (which can't be called failures because everytime they have learnt something from it )spacex has not loosen any hope and is trying even harder to reach orbit this year .After the explosion of sn 4 workers have almost repaired the launch site and sn 5 is ready to be transported to the launch site for its testing .Sn 6 is also almost ready with parts of sn 7 lying around the site .spacex will try to do 150 m hop in june with sn 5 and longer flights of 20 km probably 1-2 months after that .

Sn 5 and sn6 in high bay 
(Credit-boca chica gal/nasa spaceflight)

To reach orbit in this year spacex has to work even harder and even one failure from now will make it harder to do so in this year but from now if everything will go well there's a good chance that spacex will reach orbit with starship this year.

•WILL WE SEE HUMANS ON MARS BY 2024

At the speed spacex is building prototypes and testing them it is possible but this is only true if everything goes well but in spaceflight industry this never happens there are always some setback and starship is the most ambitious project ever undertaken by human beings and its success relies on some technologies that have never been tested before.

At last i want to say that even if starship doesn't take people to mars in 2024 it will definitely happen in this decade.

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