# Starship keeps exploding **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Tags:** elon-musk\ **Created:** [May 28, 2025, 4:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/starship-keeps-exploding/1018911 "2025-05-28T16:54:49Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 17\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![susan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/susan/32/17537_2.png) [@susan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/susan)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2025, 10:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/starship-keeps-exploding/1018911/101 "2025-09-18T22:38:13Z")
Will there be guns? ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2025, 10:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/starship-keeps-exploding/1018911/102 "2025-09-18T22:39:02Z")
I’m cautiously optimistic that Starship development is back on track and that it may be a functioning launch system in perhaps 2-3 years; how _well_ it functions will have to be seen. A launch a week is a far cry from ten a day, the latter would be necessary to seriously consider a colonization effort. IF a lot of things go very right, I could see there being a pilot refueling base on Mars sufficient to demonstrate returning a Starship from Mars ten years from now. The hardware would have to be reliable, fecund and economical. THEN it would be possible to begin serious discussion of the feasibility of a Mars colony. > [@susan](#): > > Will there be guns? I’m not sure I follow… ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2025, 11:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/starship-keeps-exploding/1018911/103 "2025-09-18T23:25:15Z")
Wiki sez musk is age 54 now. I doubt the Mars colony effort survives him. He’s real late to this game. ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2025, 11:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/starship-keeps-exploding/1018911/104 "2025-09-18T23:38:07Z")
I’m less concerned with a Mars colony than I am about what SpaceX hopes to build in the course of attempting to make a Mars colony possible: a low-cost high capacity space launch system that will begin to fulfill the hopes and dreams of space enthusiasts. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2025, 11:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/starship-keeps-exploding/1018911/105 "2025-09-18T23:44:55Z")
Agreed. But I have a very hard time imagining that orbital industry growing into starship’s break-even flight rate without the colony effort to drive them down the cost curve. IMO … The irrational colony effort is necessary to get launch costs down to where rational business folks can build a profitable orbital industrial economy on the back of cheap enough Starship lift. In this case the egg of mature cheap high rate Starship ops is what hatches the chicken of orbital industry. So something else has to create the egg first. That’s this wacky Mars idea. ---
**Author:** ![susan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/susan/32/17537_2.png) [@susan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/susan)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2025, 11:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/starship-keeps-exploding/1018911/106 "2025-09-18T23:45:26Z")
> [@Darren\_Garrison](#): > > [Elon Musk: Self-sustaining city on Mars is plausible in 25-30 years](https://www.teslarati.com/elon-musk-self-sustaining-mars-city-plausible-25-30-years/) ^ Musk. Surely guns are a sign of civilization. Open carry on Mars will keep everyone polite and no one will shoot a hole in the dome, right? ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2025, 11:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/starship-keeps-exploding/1018911/107 "2025-09-18T23:48:06Z")
If he only allows Aryans on his colony ships there won’t be any need for guns there to shoot the _untermenschen_. Since there won’t be any. ---
**Author:** ![susan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/susan/32/17537_2.png) [@susan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/susan)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2025, 11:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/starship-keeps-exploding/1018911/108 "2025-09-18T23:50:11Z")
That’s what the Khmer Rouge said, but they ate their own. ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2025, 11:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/starship-keeps-exploding/1018911/109 "2025-09-18T23:51:23Z")
I was unaware that Musk had voiced any opinions on firearms. And in any case SpaceX ≠ Musk. ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [September 18, 2025, 11:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/starship-keeps-exploding/1018911/110 "2025-09-18T23:56:06Z")
> [@Lumpy](#): > > And in any case SpaceX ≠ Musk. Of course it does. ---
**Author:** ![Zoobi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/13edae/32.png) [@Zoobi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zoobi)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2025, 12:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/starship-keeps-exploding/1018911/111 "2025-09-19T00:02:13Z")
> ---
**Author:** ![dtilque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d6d6ee/32.png) [@dtilque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dtilque)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2025, 12:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/starship-keeps-exploding/1018911/112 "2025-09-19T00:27:38Z")
Well, it sure looks like there’s guns in that picture. Anyway, if he’s building a SpaceArk, doesn’t he first have to figure out how long a cubit is? ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2025, 12:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/starship-keeps-exploding/1018911/113 "2025-09-19T00:37:07Z")
Those guns are keeping the human rabble off the ship. That makes them Good in musk’s mind. ---
**Author:** ![OttoDaFe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ottodafe/32/356_2.png) [@OttoDaFe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OttoDaFe)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2025, 12:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/starship-keeps-exploding/1018911/114 "2025-09-19T00:38:17Z")
Don’t see any red diapers, though. ---
**Author:** ![dtilque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d6d6ee/32.png) [@dtilque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dtilque)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2025, 12:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/starship-keeps-exploding/1018911/115 "2025-09-19T00:48:06Z")
> [@LSLGuy](#): > > Those guns are keeping the human rabble off the ship. But they also have to control the Martian rabble at the other end of the trip. ---
**Author:** ![Lumpy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lumpy/32/446_2.png) [@Lumpy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lumpy)\ **Post date:** [September 19, 2025, 1:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/starship-keeps-exploding/1018911/116 "2025-09-19T01:08:40Z")
No no, that’s the Space Circus embarking for their next big show on Ganymede. At least that version didn’t feature two **maned** lions like some have. ---
**Author:** ![scudsucker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/scudsucker/32/14101_2.png) [@scudsucker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scudsucker)\ **Post date:** [September 20, 2025, 3:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/starship-keeps-exploding/1018911/117 "2025-09-20T03:43:10Z")
> [@Lumpy](#): > > At least that version didn’t feature two **maned** lions like some have. Weirdly, [maned lionesses exist](https://www.newscientist.com/article/2106866-five-wild-lionesses-grow-a-mane-and-start-acting-like-males/). But Noah would have been a little foolish to take one, she probably would be infertile. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/starship-keeps-exploding/1018911.md?page=5)