Keith Cooper is a freelance science journalist and editor in the United Kingdom, and has a degree in physics and astrophysics from the University of Manchester.
SpaceX's plans to launch its Starship–Super Heavy two-stage rocket 44 times per year from NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida have come under fire from its two main rivals: United Launch Alliance and Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin.vehicle is the world's largest rocket. Its two stages are SpaceX's Super Heavy booster rocket, and the upper stage spacecraft known somewhat confusingly as Starship or"Ship," on which a crew of up to 100 astronauts could someday fly.
"As the largest rocket in existence," wrote ULA,"an accident would inflict serious or even catastrophic damage, while normal launch operations would have a cumulative impact on structures, launch vehicle hardware and other critical launch support equipment." "Blowing debris into state parks or national land is not what we prescribed, but the bottom line is no one got hurt, no one got injured," The FAA's Associate Administrator for Commercial Space Transportation Kelvin B. Coleman told the New York Times."We certainly don't want people to feel like they're bulldozed. But it's a really important operation that SpaceX is conducting down there. It is really important to our civilian space program.
ULA also questions SpaceX's decision to stop using offshore drone ships to land the Super Heavy booster on, and to instead land them back on 39A, which they say"shifts the risks of a system failure onto the communities, businesses, and environment that surround KSC."
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