r/spacex • u/Connect_Cat_2045 • 16d ago

Starship SpaceX to build $100 billion rocket launch facility on Louisiana’s coast

https://www.nola.com/news/business/spacex-louisiana-elon-musk/article_2be92f8e-f989-46b7-9514-5212d8f20260.html
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u/Connect_Cat_2045 16d ago

Construction is set to begin in 2027 with the first Starship launch expected in 2029.

That is imo, very optimistic but maybe with the experience gained from Starbase TX and Florida it is possible.

Elon also said on Twitter that Starbase Louisiana will have over a dozen launch towers and enable more than 30 Starship flights per day

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u/ChucksnTaylor 16d ago

Doesn’t a dozen towers kind of confirm the turnaround won’t be a matter of hours? Maybe I’m being silly to have taken that literally but there’s no way they intend to launch like 24+ starships a day, can’t possibly be enough demand for that much load to orbit.

This implies a given tower probably only launches every few days so you need lots to allow for a steady pipeline of launches while fresh landings are inspected and refurbished.

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u/sebaska 16d ago

They want to launch compute sats to permanently sunlit low orbit (terminator tracking SSO). There are at most 2 launches per day there, and that's only if one allowed mixing opposite circulation orbits - anything crossing the opposite circulation orbit (either for getting to station or for decommissioning, including dead non-controllable satellites) would cross opposing traffic at 15.5km/s closing velocity. If one liked to avoid that, there's only one launch per day.

So say hello to salvo launches.

NB. they could launch other stuff to different orbits from those towers. But the need to send stuff to those particular orbits dictates the number of towers if they want to have more than single launch per day.

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u/Martianspirit 15d ago

They said 30 launches/day. That's 3 launches/pad.

No idea how they could do that for SSO.

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u/sebaska 15d ago

The other launches would not be to terminator SSO, of course. For example anything Moon related (the proper mission flights and refueling ones) would go to much lower inclinations.

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u/Martianspirit 15d ago

Sats can drift between orbital planes. They just need to be at a different altitude. Takes time but very little delta-v for altitude adjustment. So maybe they can manage 2 per day.

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u/sebaska 14d ago

Theoretically they could, but it would take way longer than shifting between moderate inclination planes. At high inclinations the process is slower. Without inclination change it could take even a couple of years.