SpaceX/Tesla/Paypal founder Elon Musk appeared on Jimmy Kimmel Live to talk to Jimmy for about ten minutes, and the show has uploaded the interview to its YouTube account for those intrigued by Musk’s story to enjoy.
As an added bonus, the topic of sex robots does come up.
Here you go:
It’s been about fourteen months since the first successful private spaceship launch, Dragon, and now that same space exploration company is prepping to step into their next phase: a human-piloted launch.
SpaceX, founded by PayPal co-founder Elon Musk, is preparing the next flight test in which the Dragon spacecraft will go to the International Space Station: first with supplies then, later, with humans. SpaceX is notable in space exploration history as it was the first private company to ever receive the Federal Aviation Administration’s commercial license to reenter a spacecraft from orbit. More, in safely returning its spacecraft to earth, SpaceX achieved what only six countries on earth have been able to do.
Since the success of Dragon back in 2010, the company’s been working on the crew cabin digs for Dragon to function in both nominal and off-nominal scenarios. Details were provided from an update on SpaceX’s website:
The engineering prototype includes seven seats as well as representations of crew accommodations such as lighting, environmental control and life support systems, displays, cargo racks, and other interior systems. During the daylong test, SpaceX and NASA evaluators including four NASA astronauts, participated in human factors assessments which covered entering and exiting Dragon under both normal and contingency cases, as well as reach and visibility evaluations. The seven seats mount to strong, lightweight supporting structures attached to the pressure vessel walls. Each seat can hold an adult up to 6 feet 5 inches tall, 250 lbs, and has a liner that is custom-fit for the crewmember.
As you can see, the crew looks like they’re having a pretty good time fitting their seats out.
If that wasn’t big enough, the cabin also has enough room to accomodate three additional people. To convey exactly how capacious this shuttle is, SpaceX notes that a three-person Soyuz capsule descent module could fit inside of Dragon’s pressure vessel. For reference’s sake, the Soyuz had more than seven cubic meters of living space inside of it. For you non-metric minded, that’s over 247 cubic feet. In other words, say goodbye to astro-claustrophobia.
That white-coated gent in the center there, by the way, is Musk calmly contemplating the future of space exploration.
Back in December 2010, Gizmodo, who tipped off the news of SpaceX’s plans for a human-piloted launch, documented Dragon’s first successful launch with live coverage as well with a couple of videos of the launch.
Below you can check out an altitude test of Dragon that was conducted back in August 2010 in order to confirm the functionality of the parachute deployment systems and recovery options.
If all goes well with SpaceX’s plans this year, the company stands to press the business of space exploration into some exhilarating new directions.
Head of NASA Ames Research Center, Dr. S. Pete Worden, has said that he expects any colonization of Mars, the Moon, or asteroids to be done by private companies.
Dr. Worden has been very valuable to NASA: “In the past three years, Worden has completely transformed Ames, reinvigorating the center’s workforce and taking a leadership role in important, cost-effective small satellite missions. ”
According to The Register, Worden told them that “the agency was firmly enmeshing itself with the private sector. […] governments can develop new technology and do some of the exciting early exploration but in the long run it’s the private sector that finds ways to make profit, finds ways to expand humanity. That’s really our tack.”
He explained that explorations throughout history have tended to be paid with moneys from independently wealthy individuals, government funds, and corporations.
Wealthy entrepreneurs like PayPal and SpaceX co-founder, Elon Musk, have held conversations with Worden about funding settlement missions to the moon. Musk believes that it is very important that humans become multi-planetary while they can.
Beyond funding concerns, there are other limitations to having NASA execute these types of missions. Settlement missions to Mars would have to be one way, and that is only something that can be achieved in the private sector. There is no government funded mission that could keep someone on Mars forever if they changed their mind.
Google has a team of engineers working on technology that it can sell to space companies and orbit-happy entrepreneurs like Musk. I call them Google SpaceGoods.
Tiffany Montague, a former US Air Force high-altitude pilot, is the manager of Google’s space initiatives. Her official work title with Google is “Intergalactic Federation King Almighty and Commander of the Universe.” How humbling.
Montague says that Google’s SpaceGoods are “[seeing] an emerging market. Not everything we do is tied to immediate revenue; we take a long-range view of the world. That said, we hope in the very long run that they will make money too.”
This commander has applied to become an Astronaut twice and hopes that everyone will be able to enter space if they want.
Her desire to become space bound is so strong that she even told The Register that if she can’t get a trip to the moon in her lifetime she will try to increase her odds with cryogenics.
Imagine Montague in 2222 A.D. coming to from her cryogenic coma. When she is asked who she is and states that she was a pilot and Intergalactic Federation King Almighty and Commander of the Universe for Google, people might think she is a goddess from the future.