Elon Musk claims SpaceX could land a spacecraft on Mars in ‘3 to 4 years’

SpaceX launched Starship for its first uncrewed test flight from the company’s Starbase facility in Boca Chica on April 20 this year. But minutes after the launch, the upper stage of the launch vehicle failed to separate from the lower-stage Super Heavy, and it exploded in mid-air. The mission’s goal was to complete a 90-minute debut flight, but it lasted less than four minutes, ending in failure.

While speaking at the event on Thursday, Musk said that SpaceX does not want to “set expectations too high” after the April explosion, reports Space.com. The billionaire founder hopes that the Starship rocket can eventually realise his long-held ambition of landing humans on Mars.

But that still seems quite far away for Starship, which was grounded in September by the United States Federal Aviation Administration (FAA).

The FAA said that it took the decision after closing an investigation into the April explosion. It cited many causes that could have led to the mishap and said that SpaceX must take 63 corrective actions to ensure that such an incident does not happen. A Reuters report shortly after the grounding quoted an FAA official who said that it could advance a launch license for it to happen as early as October.

SpaceX claims that it has addressed all the issues brought up by the FAA. But so far, it is yet to receive a license for the launch from the federal regulator. The company will also have to acquire additional environmental approvals for it launch.