Threshold in orbit (Indian Express)

Mains Paper 3 : Science and Tech
Prelims level : Reusable rocket system
Mains level : Reusable rocket system and its key benefits

Context

• A rocket system that can ferry people back and forth between earth and orbit is the threshold for the leap to the planets and the stars.

Background

• Space entrepreneur Elon Musk, long criticised for setting unrealistic deadlines, and then criticised some more for trying to meet them with an inhuman work schedule, has done it again.
• He threatens to put a prototype of his heavy and reusable rocket Starship into orbit in six months. It’s a deadline that even the engineers of the Apollo 11 mission, who won the race to space, would have balked at, and
  they had a government budget and a huge space industry at their command.

Reusable rocket system

• A reusable rocket system — rather than single-use rockets for every flight — is the Holy Grail of space exploration.
• A rocket system that can ferry people back and forth between earth and orbit is the threshold for the leap to the planets and the stars.
• It is speculated that craft with other propulsion modes unsuitable for use near planets, like ion drives, could take over from there, propelling crews at tremendous speeds to distances now unimaginable.
• The existing transport system on earth works efficiently because people can easily change modes bus to train or plane, then bus or taxi to the final destination.
• Space mass transport would probably be similarly variegated and interconnected.

Why is Musk in such a hurry to extend consciousness beyond earth?

• It is because he believes that consciousness is up to no good down here.
• Musk has repeatedly sounded warnings about artificial intelligence, currently the Holy Grail of communications technology, running wild.
• Even if the AIs don’t get us, climate change will. It appears certain that extreme events at shorelines will be experienced by people alive today.
• Against this grim backdrop, the sands of Mars as depicted by Edgar Rice Burroughs may seem inviting, and reaching earth orbit would be the first leg of the journey to safety.

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Prelims Questions:

Q.1) Which hunting tool used in the Palaeolithic period?
1. Axes
2. Sword
3. Choppers and chopping tools
4. Knives flakes

Which of the statements given above is/are correct-?
A. Only 1, 2 and 3
B. Only 1, 2 and 4
C. Only 1, 3 and 4
D. All of the Above

Answer: C
Mains Questions:
Q.1) What is reusable rocket system? Why is Musk in such a hurry to extend consciousness beyond earth?