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Starship’s Super Heavy Booster Looks Like a Human-Infested Eye of a Transformer

Whether you liked them or not, we’re pretty sure most of you remember Michael Bay’s Transformer movies, those insane visual adventures that at times hurt the eyes and at times delight the senses. Kind of like the main photo of this piece does.
Starship Super Heavy booster 6 photos
Photo: Elon Musk/Twitter
SpaceX Starship renderingSpaceX Starship renderingSpaceX Starship renderingSpaceX Starship renderingStarship SN15
What you’re looking at is a shot (click main photo to enlarge) of the “feed system for 29 Raptor rocket engines on Super Heavy Booster.” It’s an image posted not long ago by Elon Musk and, if you look at it just right, it looks like the eye of one of those Michael Bay Transformers. And it has people in it, making it appear as it suffers from some kind of human infestation.

In reality, those humans are there with the purpose of getting the Starship ready for its first orbital flight. That should happen during this half of the year, if all goes well, opening another chapter in the history of SpaceX in particular and space exploration in general.

The Super Heavy is in essence the rocket that should put the Starship in orbit and, later down the road, on a path to the Moon and possibly even Mars. The massive piece of hardware needs 29 Raptor engines to fly on its first mission, with an additional 4 to be added for later flights.

Raptor is how SpaceX calls its Starship rocket engines, and have been designed to power both the first stage (Super Heavy) and the second stage (Starship) of the assembly, running on a mixture of liquid oxygen and liquid methane.

As said, there is no exact date set for the Starship orbital flight. In mid-July, the company performed the first static fire test of the Super Heavy, when just three of the Raptor engines were fired. Next in line could be a nine-engine firing test, and possibly more attempts, before we actually get to see Starship take to space.
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About the author: Daniel Patrascu
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Daniel loves writing (or so he claims), and he uses this skill to offer readers a "behind the scenes" look at the automotive industry. He also enjoys talking about space exploration and robots, because in his view the only way forward for humanity is away from this planet, in metal bodies.
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