New design for SpaceX Lunar Starship

During the livestream of Starship Flight test 6 SpaceX presented a new design for the Lunar Starship (Human Landing System) which NASA has selected for the Artemis missions returning humans to the surface of the Moon. According to the current schedule SpaceX is tasked to get Artemis III crew on the surface of the Moon in the end of 2026; we estimate this mission will slip for about two years – to 2028 because developing a human-rated spacecraft is a lot harder task than building "just" a cargo rocket.

An upgraded Lunar Starship for later Artemis missions:

SpaceX Starship orbital flight test 6 is scheduled on November 19

The 6th integrated flight test of SpaceX's Starship rocket (booster B13, ship S31) is targeted to launch on Tuesday, November 19 from Starbase, Boca Chica, Texas. It will be the last flight test of Starship Super Heavy v1 before moving to v2 prototypes. The 30-minute launch window will open at 4:00 p.m. CT.

SpaceX: "Starship’s fifth flight test [on October 13] was a seminal moment in iterating towards a fully and rapidly reusable launch system. On the first attempt, the Super Heavy booster successfully returned to the launch site and was caught by the chopstick arms of the launch and catch tower at Starbase. Starship’s upper stage went on to demonstrate several improvements, resulting in a controlled entry and high accuracy splashdown at the targeted area in the Indian Ocean. The next Starship flight test aims to expand the envelope on ship and booster capabilities and get closer to bringing reuse of the entire system online. Objectives include the booster once again returning to the launch site for catch, reigniting a ship Raptor engine while in space, and testing a suite of heatshield experiments and maneuvering changes for ship reentry and descent over the Indian Ocean."

Starship Super Heavy on launch mount before Flight Test 6 with Starbase Starship factory in the background:

Spaceship above Olympus Mons on Mars by Graham Gazzard

Picture of the Day 02/11/2024 - Spaceship in orbit above Olympus Mons, the largest volcano in the Solar System, by British sci-fi and aviation artist Graham Gazzard (also known as GrahamTG).

SpaceX Starship orbital flight test 5 - infographic by Tony Bela

Today US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) finally issued a launch license for the 5th integrated flight test of SpaceX's Starship rocket (booster B12, ship S30)! Here is an infographic of the upcoming flight test by Australian space illustrator Tony Bela. The flight is scheduled as soon as Sunday, October 13 (the 30-minute test window opens at 7:00 a.m. CT) from Starbase, Boca Chica, Texas.

This will be the 1st attempt to return the Super Heavy booster to the launch site and catch it.

SpaceX: "The fifth flight test of Starship will aim to take another step towards full and rapid reusability. The primary objectives will be attempting the first ever return to launch site and catch of the Super Heavy booster and another Starship reentry and landing burn, aiming for an on-target splashdown of Starship in the Indian Ocean. Extensive upgrades ahead of this flight test have been made to hardware and software across Super Heavy, Starship, and the launch and catch tower infrastructure at Starbase. One of the key upgrades on Starship ahead of flight was a complete rework of its heatshield, with SpaceX technicians spending more than 12,000 hours replacing the entire thermal protection system with newer-generation tiles, a backup ablative layer, and additional protections between the flap structures."

Tim Dodd, the Everyday Astronaut explaining HOW and WHY SpaceX will catch the booster:

Garden inside a dome on Mars by Bryan Versteeg

Canadian concept artist Bryan Versteeg has created a concept of a human base on Mars featuring a recreational garden inside a small crater covered with a transparent dome.

Garden under a geodesic dome

Picture of the Day 07/09/2024 - design of a garden under a geodesic dome for the King Salman Park in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia to be opened this year as the largest urban park in the world. Public gardens in future Arab settlements on Mars could look similar as this design.

Terraformed Mars by Mark Garlick

Picture of the Day 01/09/2024 - a FHD wallpaper (1920 x 1080) with a globe of terraformed Mars by British illustrator Mark Garlick. More of his art here.

Starship development history from Starhopper to Flight test 3

While waiting for SpaceX's Starship orbital Flight test 5 in September, which will be the first to try to catch the Super Heavy booster, we can look back on the history of Starship's development. US 3D artist Nick Henning has created an animation with every test from Starhopper's 150m hop in August 2019 to Starship's orbital Flight test 3 in April 2024:

Elevated train near a human colony on the Moon

Picture of the Day 17/08/2024 - Painting of an elevated train near a human colony on the Moon by French urban artist Colin Doublier.

The colonization of Mars in "The Martian Chronicles" (1980) TV series

The Martian Chronicles is a 1980 television 3-episode miniseries based on Ray Bradbury's 1950 science fiction novel with the same name The Martian Chronicles which was originally not written as a singular work but as short stories published separately in late 1940s.

The novel and TV series chronicles the exploration and settlement of Mars, the home of indigenous Martians, at the beginning of 21st century when human settlers leave the troubled Earth that is eventually devastated by a nuclear war. The series depicts Mars as having a "thin atmosphere" which humans can breathe, with desert-like vegetation and water-filled canals, cities and other alien structures built by the indigenous Martians thousands of years ago.

The Martian Chronicles TV series, aired on 1980, is one of the few works of science fiction to depict Mars, in the period between the initial Mars enthusiasm that ended in the 1960s, characterized by fear of hostile Martians, and the revival of Mars-related science fiction in the 2000s already without the Martians.

The Martian Chronicles are divided into three parts / episodes:

1. The Expeditions - the exploration of Mars begins with two failed expeditions. Colonel Wilder then leads a 3rd crew to discover the secret of Mars - only to find all the Martians dead from chicken pox.
2. The Settlers - with native Martians wiped out by disease, thousands of humans now colonize the red planet and attempt to create a second Earth.
3. The Martians - with Earth destroyed in a nuclear war, there are only a few survivors on Mars, including Wilder's family. To rebuild what he has lost, Wilder chooses to make Mars his new home.

Here is a collection of screenshots from the series. Keep in mind that the series is from 1980 and the creators were trying to replicate the retrofuturistic style of the illustrations from an even older novel from 1950.

First expeditions to Mars: