SpaceX is a company best known for optimization in rocket technology and has goals to send
humanity to mars as soon as possible.
In 2016, they started constructing a test and launch site for their rockets in Boca Chica, Texas.
And recently, we even saw the SN-8 prototype starship flying around
Let’s talk about “Boca Chica: SpaceX's Gateway to a Mars City” in today’s video of DiscoverZen.
The Boca Chica Village is a small unincorporated community in Cameron County, Texas, United States.
It was formed in the late 1960s and is still extant as of 2020,
although the village proper has changed greatly since 2018 as
industrial business enterprises came to occupy much of the land of the village.
It lies 20 miles or 32 kilometers east of the City of Brownsville, Texas
on the Boca Chica Peninsula and forms part of the Brownsville–Harlingen–Raymondville and the Matamoros–Brownsville metropolitan area.
It is situated on Texas State Highway 4, immediately south of the South Bay lagoon, and is located
about 2 miles or 3.2 kilometers northwest of the mouth of the Rio Grande.
In August 2014, SpaceX announced that they had selected the Boca Chica area as the location
for their South Texas spaceport and that their "control center" would actually be on land
in the village property, while the launch complex would be located two miles to the east.
Limited construction began that year, but more extensive construction activities did
not begin until approximately 2018.
By May 2018, the site was expected to be used exclusively for launches of the SpaceX second-generation
fully-reusable launch vehicle, which was eventually named SpaceX Starship in late 2018, and the
launch complex was no longer planned to become a third launch site for Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy.
The Flight testing of the SpaceX Starship with the newly designed Raptor rocket engine
began in 2019 and is being continued till now.
With the village being only a couple of miles from the test site, in August 2019, Cameron
County officials followed the FAA Regulatory and began to request residents to stand outside
their homes during any tests that involve loading of propellant fuel, due to perceived
danger from shock-wave induced broken windows in the event of a test anomaly and explosion.
In September 2019, SpaceX extended an offer to buy each of the houses in Boca Chica Village
for three times the fair market value along with an offer of VIP invitations to future launch events.
The amount of the offer (3x) was said to be "non-negotiable."
Homeowners were initially given two weeks for that particular offer to remain valid.
Some property owners were happy with the offer and made plans to accept it,
including one South Dakota owner who was happy to receive 3 times what she paid for the property in 2012.
But others were not, noting that they had made substantial improvements to their properties
and that the base valuation used by the September process used county tax assessment valuations
and did not look at the specifics of each house so could not be a full appraised valuation.
Now let’s look at the construction and progress of the SpaceX site.
Major site construction at SpaceX's launch site in Boca Chica got underway in 2016, with
site soil preparation for the launch pad in a process said to take two years, with significant
additional soil work and significant construction beginning in late 2018.
By September 2019, the site had been transformed into an operational launch site, outfitted
with the ground support equipment needed to support test flights of the methane-fueled Starship vehicles.
Lighter construction of fencing and temporary buildings in the control center area had begun in 2014.
The Texas launch location was projected in the 2013 draft EIS to include a 20-acre vertical
launch area and a 12.2-acre area for a launch control center and a launchpad directly adjacent
to the eastern terminus of Texas State Highway - 4.
SpaceX broke ground on the new launch site in September 2014 but indicated then that
the principal work to build the facility was not expected to ramp up until late 2015 after
the SpaceX launch site development team completed work on Kennedy Space Center Launch Pad 39A,
as the same team was expected to manage the work to build the Boca Chica facility.
Advance preparation work was expected to commence ahead of that.
As of 2014, SpaceX anticipated spending approximately US$100 million over three to four years to
build the Texas facility, while the Texas state government expected to spend US$15 million
to extend utilities and infrastructure to support the new spaceport.
The design phase for the facility was completed by March 2015.
In the event, construction was delayed by the destruction of one of SpaceX’s two Florida
launch facilities in a September 2016 rocket explosion, which tied up the launch site design
and build teams for over a year.
In order to stabilize the waterlogged ground at the coastal site, SpaceX engineers determined
that a process known as soil surcharging would be required.
For this to happen, around 310,000 cubic yards or 240,000 cubic meters of new soil was trucked
to the facility between October 2015 and January 2016.
In January 2016, following additional soil testing that revealed foundation problems,
SpaceX indicated they were not planning to complete construction until 2017, and the
first launch from Boca Chica was not expected until late 2018.
In February 2016, SpaceX President and COO Gwynne Shotwell stated that construction had
been delayed by poor soil stability at the site, and that "two years of dirt work" would
be required before SpaceX could build the launch facility, with construction costs expected
to be higher than previously estimated.
The first phase of the soil stabilization process was completed by May 2016.
Two 30 feet or 9-meter S-band tracking station antennas, were installed at the site in 2016–2017.
Formerly used to track the Space Shuttle during launch and landing, and made operational as
tracking resources for crewed Dragon missions in 2018.
SpaceX-owned 6.5-acre photovoltaic power station was installed on-site to provide off-grid
electrical power near the control center.
The solar farm was installed by SolarCity in January 2018.
In late 2018, construction ramped up considerably, and the site saw the development of a large
propellant tank farm, a gas flare, more offices, and a small flat square launch pad.
The Starhopper prototype was relocated to the pad in March 2019 and first flew in late July 2019.
The "Mars Crossing" subdivision developed into a shipyard, with the development of several
large hangars, and several concrete jigs, on top of which large steel rocket airframes
were fabricated, the first of which became the Starhopper test article.
In February 2019, SpaceX confirmed that the first orbit-capable Starship and Super Heavy
test articles would be manufactured nearby, at the "SpaceX South Texas build site.”
By September 2019, the facility had been completely transformed into a new phase of an industrial
rocket build facility, working multiple shifts and more than five days a week, able to support
large rocket ground and flight testing.
The latest Starship prototype, a shiny silver vehicle known as SN8 was launched on an epic
high-altitude test flight on December 9th, 2020, taking off at 5:45 p.m. EST or 22:45 GMT
from SpaceX's facility near the South Texas village of Boca Chica.
The goal was to soar about 7.8 miles or 12.5 kilometers into the sky, perform some complex
aerial maneuvers — including a "belly flop" like the one the final Starship will perform
when coming back to Earth on operational flights — and then land safely near the launch stand.
The 165-foot or 50-meters-tall SN8 appeared to notch all of these big milestones, except
for the final one: The vehicle hit its landing mark but came in too fast, exploding in a
dramatic fireball 6 minutes and 42 seconds after liftoff.
But still, the launch is considered to be successful as it was one of the best engines
in the rocket industry flown successfully to date.
Now let’s look at why SpaceX chose Boca Chica over any other place in the USA...
Well, there are many reasons for it...
The East Coast is in general best for launches into most orbits that SpaceX would be interested in for the Starship.
This is because if SpaceX launches to the east, they can take advantage of the rotation
of the earth to save some energy, and that means more payload instead of fuel.
They can launch to the east from anywhere of course, but then the rocket goes over land
and in the US, at least, there is a general dislike for dropping bits of the rocket on land.
And although SpaceX recovers most of its first stages now, it’s still a risk that US authorities wouldn’t like.
Since the land in Boca Chica is so cheap, SpaceX built their own spaceport, which in
the long run, will be cheaper than renting a launchpad in Cape Canaveral or Vandenberg,
which they used to pay tens of millions a year in rent.
Also, Texas gave SpaceX the regulatory and financial intensives making the overall cost of the mission even cheaper.
We understand the reasons behind SpaceX moving to Boca Chica.
Now let’s discuss “ The Working of SpaceX Starship - the most ambitious rocket ever made”.
Well, that sounds like a different topic to investigate on DiscoverZen.