On Wednesday, SpaceX released a pretty cool promo video for its commercial crew development program. If it were any other commercial spaceflight company, I probably would have filed it under “Nice, but we’ve got a long way to go.” But this is SpaceX, a company that is proving its launch capabilities year after year, the most recent landmark launch being the flight of the Dragon capsule last year.
But company founder Elon Musk has far loftier goals than simply putting stuff into low-Earth orbit. That’s so last century. No, he wants to see SpaceX go to Mars, facilitating the expansion of mankind’s influence throughout the solar system. If there’s someone wanting a ride, Musk wants SpaceX to be the first company they call.