SpaceX is known for its ambitious space projects. Nonetheless, not all the projects become a reality. For example, not that long ago Elon Musk announced that the Falcon 9’s “second stage [would] be upgraded…like a mini-BFR Ship”. Now Musk returned to Twitter to announce that the mini BFR project was killed.
This spaceship project was supposed to be launched as soon as June 2019. However, all those plans were scrapped. “No, we’re just going to accelerate BFR,” announced Elon Musk in a tweet posted on November 20.
Other tweets were published earlier by Musk. For example, on November 17 he tweeted that “this is [likely] the final iteration [of BFR] in terms of broad architectural decisions”. We were also announced that this is a “radical change”, although no more details were offered.
Are major changes a good thing?
Improvement is always a good thing, but we can’t help but wonder if all these “radical changes” won’t damage the project. Resources and effort can become wasted if last-minute changes occur constantly, and there is also a chance that the quality of the project will be affected as well.
Obviously, something this complex will require more than one try, but we also have to remember that BFR is a project that exists for a few years, and it might not be a good thing to have radical design changes after all this time.
Nonetheless, even if BFR does not live up to our expectations, this does not mean that there aren’t many other SpaceX promising projects. After all the company managed to make some major breakthroughs and we can already consider it revolutionary. We can only wait to see how the BFR project will evolve in the future and what other surprises will be announced.
As our second lead editor, Anna C. Mackinno provides guidance on the stories Great Lakes Ledger reporters cover. She has been instrumental in making sure the content on the site is clear and accurate for our readers. If you see a particularly clever title, you can likely thank Anna. Anna received a BA and and MA from Fordham University.