Picture this: You’re relaxing on the porch of your beach space in Florida, when the deafening roar of a large spaceship streaks through the sky above you, shaking the windows and doors with enormous force.
This is now believed to occur more than 70 times a year.
That situation is likely due to SpaceX CEO Elon Musk’s plans to release dozens of regional flights a year from Cape Canaveral, the Wall Street Journal reports, and the prospect has residents, fishermen, airline pilots, environmentalists, and even rival area corporations worried.
In Canaveral, Musk has been reading two separate launch sites for Starship, the world’s largest space rocket that stands 397 feet tall and a mainstay of NASA’s long-term lunar missions and Musk’s ambitions to colonize Mars.
According to the WSJ, a NASA-controlled Starship could see up to 44 launches. In another overseen by Space Force, the Starship could launch up to 76 times a year.
It would be quite a stir, according to the WSJ, because the giant spacecraft, which is being tested lately in Texas, has the same thrust force as 160 Boeing 787 commercial jets taking off at the same time from the same location.
Residents are concerned about the noise, vibrations and environmental impact of these numerous rocket launches.
Environmentalists are also disappointed by this prospect, as local traffic could be affected, the WSJ reports, while fishing operations and airline pilots are angry that Starship launches would disrupt traffic in the air and oceans for hours.
Meanwhile, rivals like Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin are concerned that Musk’s Starship will get the highest percentage of resources at the launch site.
Rocket launches already take place at Cape Canaveral several times a week, but the stress of landing on the Moon and Mars will make this domain even busier and noisier.
Officials at the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), which has been gathering public comments on Musk’s plans for Starship, said they were looking to make sure any long-term launches would comply with existing environmental standards.
But that remains to be noted in light of the New York Times’ July report that revealed that Texas for Starship pilots had recorded 19 acts of environmental destruction since 2019, all caused by rocket launches.
Perhaps after this public beating, the FAA will be tougher on Musk on environmental damage. Otherwise, it is more than likely that citizens and other watchdogs are intensively following SpaceX and those incredibly loud rocket launches.
Read more about SpaceX: Elon Musk’s SpaceX research used a hoax to open a rocket facility
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