News
Elon Musk gifts SpaceX Starship angel investor a piece of Starhopper history
According to photos posted by the Japanese investor, SpaceX CEO Elon Musk has gifted Yusaku Maezawa a significant piece of Starhopper history, a celebration of the rocket prototype’s successful flight tests and a gesture of thanks for Maezawa’s substantial support.
Back in September 2018, Musk revealed that Japanese billionaire Yusaku Maezawa had become the first true customer for SpaceX’s next-generation Starship launch vehicle. In fact, Maezawa announced DearMoon, a private spaceflight venture with the aim of sending a dozen or so artists on the first commercial crewed mission around the Moon – all for free.
In a bid to assist Starship development and simultaneously secure rights to the massive spacecraft’s first crewed lunar launch, Maezawa committed what is believed to be several hundred million dollars of his personal fortune to SpaceX. In turn, the Japanese billionaire plans to select roughly a dozen artists from around the world and offering them a free ticket aboard Starship’s first crewed circumlunar launch, traveling once around the Moon and returning to Earth after 10 or so days in space.
Perhaps just a few weeks after the DearMoon announcement and Starship event, SpaceX CEO Elon Musk decided to radically change the Starship program, entirely replacing the vehicle’s main structural material of choice – carbon fiber composites – with stainless steel. The primary goal was to dramatically lower the cost of development and vehicle production and speed things up, but Musk quickly realized that steel could unintuitively be better than carbon fiber in almost every way.
After Musk’s decision, SpaceX pivoted from carbon fiber to steel at a spectacular pace. Barely six months after the design change, a SpaceX team had built up its Boca Chica, Texas facilities from almost nothing, begun to build full-scale steel hardware, and nearly completed the first low-fidelity prototype, known as Starhopper. That vehicle began propellant loading and wet dress rehearsal testing in early-April 2019 and although technical difficulties with its next-generation Raptor engines caused several months of delays, it moved into its first flight test campaign three months later.
Starhopper’s first untethered flight was completed successfully on July 25th, reaching an apogee of ~18 meters (60 ft). A little over one month later, Starhopper lifted off for the second time on a significantly more ambitious ~150m (500 ft) flight test, completed successfully after about 60 seconds in flight. That second test would be Starhopper’s last and SpaceX quickly turned its focus to completing the first full-scale, full-fidelity Starship prototypes, known as Mk1 (TX) and Mk2 (FL).
Throughout this process, Yusaku Maezawa has followed along with SpaceX. Rather than a simple lump-sum agreement, the billionaire’s contract with SpaceX is structured much more specifically, essentially allowing the company to unlock additional funding after certain milestones – like Starhopper’s flight tests – are completed. The arrangement is more of a carrot on a stick than something dead-serious – Maezawa is probably not going to completely withhold funding if SpaceX slightly misses exact targets or suffers anomalies during a complex launch vehicle development program.
In order to complete its two flight tests, Starhopper needed some kind of attitude control system (ACS) to remain stable and SpaceX chose a decidedly SpaceX-y solution, simply bolting on flight-proven Falcon 9 thruster pods. Those pods use high-pressure nitrogen to change Falcon 9’s attitude, correctly point the rocket, and settle its propellant while the rocket is in a vacuum (or freefall). They can also provided limited control authority in atmosphere, which is what SpaceX used them for on Starhopper.
As a gesture of gratitude for Maezawa’s extremely helpful financial support, SpaceX gifted him an entire Starhopper thruster pod. SpaceX often does similar things for major flight milestones, creating commemorative gifts out of retired hardware (rocket tanks, engine bells, grid fins, parachute threads, etc.) that employees are able to purchase. An entire thruster pod is at least a few orders of magnitude above that, a sign of just how grateful SpaceX is to Maezawa.
Of note, in his tweet showing off the thruster pod, Maezawa suggested that “Starship development is going better than expected”, indicating that he may “need to invite a passenger soon” for his planned circumlunar voyage around the Moon. Prior to Starship’s radical shift from carbon fiber to steel, that mission was scheduled no earlier than 2023. In recent months, SpaceX executives have made it clear that they are now targeting Starship Moon landings by 2022, suggesting that the first circumlunar missions – a far easier task than landing – could be possible even sooner than that.
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Tesla Full Self-Driving is set to receive improvements to address its two biggest issues, according to a company engineer.
Director of Engineering at Tesla AI, Phil Duan, revealed in a post on X that improvements to both pothole avoidance and navigation “are coming,’ something we have heard many times in the past. However, there are a few things that seem to hint that things might be different this time around.
Improvements on both are coming.
— Phil Duan (@pduan) October 1, 2026
Pothole avoidance, navigation, speed control, and left lane camping are some of the most prevalent and frequently mentioned shortcomings of the Full Self-Driving suite. These are a few of the biggest issues that have kept Tesla Full Self-Driving as a Supervised suite, meaning drivers must remain attentive during operation.
Pothole Avoidance
Pothole avoidance was first mentioned as an “Upcoming Improvement” with the Tesla Full Self-Driving v14.3 update back in early April of this year. It was listed alongside “Expand reasoning to all behaviors beyond destination handling.”
It’s been six months since we first saw pothole avoidance explicitly mentioned, and it has not moved beyond that and joined the main release notes yet.
Tesla has not shed any light on why pothole avoidance has been such an issue for it to solve, but it also has issues identifying large bumps much of the time, so its modeling of sudden changes in road conditions is likely pretty weak at this particular point. I’ve had more issues with large bumps than potholes, personally, but both are issues that need to be resolved.
This is that big bounce that I mentioned in the quoted post.
It’s just a tad too drastic to take at the speed FSD wants to go over it. You can see me quickly swipe down into Sloth, but I intervened. https://t.co/K20PK9ysBg pic.twitter.com/81Oc82ZJcZ
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) August 2, 2026
It makes sense that things might be pretty close to being released to the public, as we are going on such an extensive period of time between it being mentioned and it actually being deployed.
Navigation
Navigation is likely the most painful part of using Full Self-Driving, as it routinely takes strange routes, has trouble with local rules (like Except Right Turn Stop Signs in Pennsylvania), and sometimes does not realize that maneuvers it is suggesting are against the law. Turning out of my neighborhood, you cannot turn left, yet my Model Y still suggests it roughly 70 percent of the time when I’m leaving.
However, Tesla might be close to a breakthrough on this. With the Summer Update, Tesla added “Preferred Routes” alongside “Automatic Navigation.”
Preferred Routes prioritized roads that the driver had actually taken before, instead of always defaulting to what the vehicle believes is the most efficient path. This has already solved many of my issues. Formerly, I would turn off the Online Routing setting, and that would eliminate most of my complaints with routing, but then you lose out later on the Live Traffic Visualization.
Tesla’s Navigation has improved tremendously thanks to the Preferred Routes release with the Summer Update, but it still could use some polishing, as it still suggests strange routes from time to time, and it also has a lot of issues getting out of a parking lot. I find that those truly confuse FSD sometimes.
News
SpaceX’s midnight spy satellite launch quietly set a new record
Falcon Heavy launched its first NRO mission while SpaceX landed four boosters in one day.
SpaceX closed out one of its busiest days ever with a midnight Falcon Heavy launch from Florida, and the rocket’s two side boosters came home to finish off a landing record the company had never set before.
Falcon Heavy lifted off from Launch Complex 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center at 11:54 p.m. ET Thursday carrying NROL-97, a classified payload for the National Reconnaissance Office. It was the first time the NRO has flown on Falcon Heavy after 22 missions on Falcon 9, and the first NRO mission bought through the National Security Space Launch Phase 3 Lane 2 contract awarded in 2025, according to Spaceflight Now.
Falcon Heavy lifts off from pad 39A in Florida for the 14th time! pic.twitter.com/uuZLKNTdD7
— SpaceX (@SpaceX) October 2, 2026
Roughly eight minutes after liftoff, side boosters B1104 and B1072 touched down at Landing Zones 1 and 2 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, setting off double sonic booms across Brevard County. B1104 was flying for the second time and B1072 for the fourth. Both last flew on August 30 on NASA’s Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope, making NROL-97 the quickest turnaround between Falcon Heavy missions to date. The brand new center core, B1106, was expended in the Atlantic so the payload could reach its high energy orbit, and SpaceX’s mission page noted the fairing had previously flown on the NROL-95 mission in July.
The two landings capped a record for SpaceX. Earlier Thursday, Falcon 9 booster B1101 returned to Landing Zone 40 after sending the Crew-13 astronauts to the International Space Station, and another Falcon 9 launched the Transporter-18 rideshare with 130 payloads from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California. Spaceflight Now reported it was the first time SpaceX has landed four boosters in a single day, wrapping up the triple header Teslarati previewed on Wednesday.
Falcon Heavy’s side boosters land on LZ-1 and LZ-2 pic.twitter.com/dBPcNeggFx
— SpaceX (@SpaceX) October 2, 2026
The mission also brought Landing Zone 1 back for what may be its final landing. SpaceX first landed an orbital class booster there in December 2015, but its lease on the former Launch Complex 13 site ended in 2025 as the company moved Florida landings to new pads at its own launch complexes. With LZ-40 already holding the Crew-13 booster, SpaceX brought LZ-1 back into service for one more night. Launch tracker Next Spaceflight listed NROL-97 as the final expected landing at the site.
NROL-97 adds to a fast growing stack of national security work for SpaceX. The company has flown four Space Force missions from Vandenberg since mid August, several believed to carry Starshield satellites, pushing its Pentagon contract total for 2026 past $8 billion. Elon Musk was also named this week to help lead the Pentagon’s Project Meridian study on the future of warfare.
The Florida doubleheader stood out for another reason. The Space Coast saw only one launch in all of September as SpaceX shifts more of its East Coast infrastructure toward Starship, which reached orbit for the first time on Flight 14 just three days earlier.
Tesla (NASDAQ: TSLA) reported strong delivery figures that beat Wall Street guesses, and they were revealed alongside the company’s second-best quarter in terms of energy deployments ever.
Tesla announced this morning that it delivered 486,532 cars in Q3, while producing 464,391, exceeding analyst consensus, which sat around 462,000 units.
Meanwhile, Tesla reported 13.7 GWh of energy storage deployed for the quarter. That’s the second-best quarter Tesla has ever reported on that side of things.
🚨 Tesla delivered 486,532 vehicles in Q3, beating expectations at 464,391.
Big Q from the Tesla team, also 13.7 GWh of energy was deployed. pic.twitter.com/olioLWgG7a
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) October 2, 2026
Vehicle Deliveries
Deliveries were strong, and it was another quarter when Tesla had the opportunity to outshine the Wall Street pundits who are quick to criticize and slow to give credit. Tesla saw a slight decrease in deliveries compared to Q3 2025, but Tesla still had the $7,500 EV Tax Credit to use to help incentivize consumers to pick an EV.
A small decrease of 2.1 percent is pretty telling because it shows Tesla does not need massive federal credits to convince consumers to purchase its vehicles.
It was also the company’s third-best performance all-time in terms of deliveries, trailing that of Q3 2025 with 497,099 deliveries and Q4 2024, when the company handed over 495,570 cars.
We reported several days ago that Tesla Showrooms across the United States were completely bare of inventory or unclaimed units. Many locations also removed Demo Drive units, which had been bought by customers looking to take delivery sooner.
Tesla showrooms picked clean ahead of Q3 end as demand looks strong
Energy Generation
Tesla’s Energy Generation performance in Q3 was also very strong, as the company deployed 13.7 GWh of energy storage over the past three months. The only quarter when Tesla reported stronger energy deployment figures was Q4 2025, when 14.2 GWh of energy storage was deployed.
Tesla’s Q3 performance in energy generation has continued to grow each quarter, with the company increasing its deployments by ten-fold since Q3 2021, when just 1.3 GWh was deployed.
It is also nearly double what it was in Q3 2024, when the company reported 6.9 GWh. This is one of Tesla’s quickest-growing divisions, and it flies under the radar with fans and analysts, as many are focused on self-driving or the vehicles themselves.
Tesla Stock
Shares rose 5.07 percent to $372.06 at just after 10 a.m. on the East Coast. This is a rarity for Tesla after a strong delivery report, as positive news usually brings the stock down. Many quarters with extremely robust delivery reports have not been as kind to the Teslanaires of the world.
Tesla says fixes on Full Self-Driving’s two biggest issues are on the way
SpaceX’s midnight spy satellite launch quietly set a new record
