It looks like SpaceX is reviving plans to take on the commercial aviation industry – by transporting passengers to other countries via space.
Billionaire owner Elon Musk says that his ambitious vision of ‘Earth to Earth’ space travel on his Starship rocket is ‘now possible’ following Donald Trump’s re-election.
First touted by SpaceX almost a decade ago, up to 1,000 passengers would file into Starship – the most powerful rocket on Earth – and blast into orbit.
But instead of zooming into the dark abyss of space, Starship would fly ‘parallel’ with Earth as it traverses the planet’s surface, bound for another city.
Elon Musk claims it would dramatically cut the duration of air travel, saving time for businessmen and holidaymakers alike – although it’s likely they’d pay thousands of dollars per trip.
Starship could take people from London to New York in 30 minutes, New York to Shanghai in 39 minutes and Zurich to Sydney in 50 minutes, SpaceX says.
However, passengers would face G-forces during take-off and landing, while low gravity conditions mid-flight would mean they’d have to keep seatbelts buckled.
Travellers could also be advised to keep their seat tilted back during launch and ‘clench their buttocks’ as they leave and re-enter the Earth’s atmosphere.
X user @ajtourville posted the SpaceX promo video on X (Twitter), suggesting the enterprise could be cleared by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) during Trump’s presidency.
The user said: ‘Under Trump’s FAA, @SpaceX could even get Starship Earth to Earth approved in a few years – Taking people from any city to any other city on Earth in under one hour.
Musk – an avid X user who likes to keep people informed about his companies – replied simply to say: ‘This is now possible.’
Unfortunately, the multi-billionaire – who poured $130 million (£102 million) into supporting Trump’s campaign effort, CNBC reports – did not give any more details about when the project could be realised.
MailOnline has contacted SpaceX for comment.
The firm’s video, originally published in 2017, depicts a near-future where a swarm of people board a boat in the Hudson river in New York at 6:30am.
The boat then transports its passengers to a Starship rocket a few miles off-shore, which then smoothly launches into orbit at 7am sharp.
At a maximum speed of 16,700 mph (27,000 km/h), Starship zooms around the planet to Shanghai in China in just 39 minutes.
At a distance of 7,392 miles (11,897 km), New York to Shanghai on a commercial plane today takes around 15 hours.
The video finishes with the stainless-steel, 395-foot vessel making a perfect touchdown on another off-shore landing pad at Shanghai.
SpaceX advertises ‘most long distance trips in less than 30 minutes’ and anywhere on Earth in under an hour.
Although the video depicts a faultless ride from the outside, nothing is revealed about what in-flight conditions for passengers might be like.
Due to the low gravity in orbit, passengers would have to be strapped in their seats and might not be able to go to the toilet.
Musk has previously said that ‘no toilets, pilot area or food galley’ would be needed because ‘most flights would only be 15 to 20 mins’.
As a result, passengers might have to do a tactical toilet break on the boat, to save them from wetting themselves in space.
Starship’s main focus is of course ferrying humans further afield – namely the moon and eventually even other planets.
It’s due to land four astronauts on the moon as part of NASA’s Artemis 3 mission in 2026 – the first manned trip to the lunar surface since 1972.
Musk recently said SpaceX will send its multi-billion-dollar Starship rocket to Mars in 2026, although it will be an uncrewed mission.
Two years after that in 2028, Starship will transport people to Mars for the first time – which would mark the first time humans have ever walked on another planet.
However, Starship has had explosive launch tests in the last couple of years and has only just mastered getting up to space and coming back down in one piece.
Last month, SpaceX completed possibly its most impressive feat yet – it managed to catch the ‘booster’ section of the Starship system with metal ‘chopsticks’ so it could be reused.
In a jubilant post on X, Elon Musk wrote: ‘The tower has caught the rocket!!’, while SpaceX spokesperson Kate Tice called it ‘a day for the engineering history books’.
