SpaceX is building a ‘test hopper’ Mars spaceship in Texas — and Elon Musk says it could launch by March

Chris Carlson/AP

• Elon Musk said SpaceX is building a “test hopper” vehicle in Texas that could launch by March or April.
• The vehicle is a squat version of a full-scale Starship spaceship — one that’s being designed to reach Mars as part of the Big Falcon Rocket system.
• Photos taken by locals in Boca Chica, Texas (where SpaceX is building a launch site) show what appears to be the outline of a spaceship coming together.

Elon Musk logged on to Twitter this weekend to deliver a veritable sleigh full of gifts to fans of his rocket company, SpaceX, in time for Christmas.

Musk was waiting for SpaceX’s 21st (and record-breaking) rocket launch of the year on Saturday when he revealed that construction of a prototype for a Mars spaceship, called Starship, is now underway at the company’s Texas launch site.

See the rest of the story at Business Insider

NOW WATCH: Watch SpaceX launch a Tesla Roadster to Mars on the Falcon Heavy rocket — and why it matters

See Also:

• Humanity’s coolest achievements in spaceflight since Apollo 8, from walking on the moon to touching interstellar space
• Elon Musk may raise nearly $ 1.3 billion for SpaceX before 2018 is over. He’ll likely spend that money on 2 epic projects.
• A pink dwarf planet named ‘Farout’ is the most distant object that astronomers have ever discovered within the solar system

SEE ALSO: An extraordinary year of rocket launches, meteor showers, and space exploration is coming. Here’s a 2019 calendar of space events you can’t miss.

DON’T MISS: Humanity’s coolest achievements in spaceflight since Apollo 8, from walking on the moon to touching interstellar space