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NASA set for upcoming Mars mission to seek signs of ancient life on the red planet
Just three weeks ahead of liftoff, NASA and launch provider United Launch Alliance (ULA) announced that NASA’s Mars 2020 rover, Perseverance, and its Martian helicopter sidekick, Ingenuity, were mated with the Atlas V 541 rocket that will kick off the seven-month journey to the Red Planet. The precious cargo encapsulated inside of a protective payload fairing was carefully hoisted by crane operators to rest atop the Atlas V rocket. The payload joins the Atlas V common core booster, four solid rocket boosters, and the Centaur upper stage to achieve the stack’s final flight configuration height of 197 feet (60 meters).
The United Launch Alliance (ULA) payload fairing with NASA’s Mars 2020 Perseverance rover secured inside is positioned on top of the ULA Atlas V rocket inside the Vertical Integration Facility (VIF) at Space Launch Complex 41 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida on July 7, 2020. (Image Credit: NASA/Kim Shiflett)
The final stacking procedure was completed inside of the Vertical Integration Facility (VIF) at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station’s Space Launch Complex 41 (SLC-41). The rocket and payload will remain inside the protective structure and complete final check out tests until it is time quite literally roll to the launchpad. Crane operators first set down the payload for a soft touch to begin final full physical and electrical connection. The spacecraft and rocket will undergo integrated electrical testing as well as a battery of other tests as separate spacecraft and simultaneously as one complete unit.
On Friday (July 10), ULA president and chief executive officer, Tory Bruno, stated on Twitter that the Integrated Systems Test (IST) had been completed successfully. According to a previous mission statement posted to the ULA blog site, the IST is a typical pre-launch run down of the various connected systems between the spacecraft and launch vehicle to “verify proper functionality of launch vehicle systems, (and) conduct a simulated countdown and run through the launch sequence.”
The launch vehicle and integrated payload will remain inside the VIF undergoing mission-specific activities and final system checkouts over the next two weeks. Once all pre-flight activities have been successfully completed, approximately two days ahead of the scheduled launch attempt, the entire stack located on top of the Mobile Launch Platform will make the 1,800ft (550 meters) trip to the SLC-41 launchpad which will take about forty-minutes on a modified railway.
Known as an astrobiology mission and outfitted with seven instruments, the Perseverance rover will conduct new science, sample collection, and test new technology in search of ancient microbial life on the distant planet. The rover will spend the length of one Martian year – two Earth years – exploring the region around its landing site. It will collect and cache samples of the Martian surface to possibly be collected and returned to Earth by future joint missions currently under consideration by NASA and the European Space Agency.
The first interplanetary helicopter, Ingenuity, is a small 4-pound (1.8 kilograms) autonomous solar-powered aircraft that will conduct a series of experimental test flights. Ingenuity is traveling to Mars solely for a demonstrative mission and is not connected to the Perseverance rover by any means other than hitching a ride to the Red Planet. The new technology will demonstrate an ability to create lift in the thin atmosphere and lower gravity environment of Mars to help inform future aerial exploration and science delivery missions.
Currently, NASA and ULA are targeting the launch of the interplanetary mission on July 30th at 7:50 am EDT/4:50 PDT. Should they be necessary, multiple backup launch opportunities are available until the close of the interplanetary launch window on August 15th. Regardless of the launch date, after a seven-month-long, 290 million mile (467 million kilometers) journey – the rover and helicopter will arrive at Mars’s Jezero Crater, the home to an ancient Martian river delta, for a landing attempt on February 18, 2021. The landing date is perhaps even more crucial than the launch date as mission planners must take into account landing site lighting and temperature conditions and the locations of Mars-orbiting satellites required to relay crucial mission-specific information back to Earth.
Should the launch have to abort, and the 2020 window is missed completely, the robots will have to wait until 2022 when Earth’s orbit lines up just right with that of Mars, and the next interplanetary launch window opens up.
Elon Musk
SpaceX just got pulled into the biggest Weapons Program in U.S. history
SpaceX joins the Golden Dome software group, deepening its role in America’s most expensive defense program.
SpaceX has joined a nine-company group developing the core operating software for the Golden Dome, America’s next-generation missile defense system. According to a Bloomberg report, SpaceX is focused on integrating satellite communications for military operations and is working alongside eight other defense and artificial intelligence companies, including Anduril Industries, Palantir Technologies, and Aalyria Technologies, to build software connecting missile defense capabilities.
The Golden Dome concept dates back to President Trump’s 2024 campaign, and on January 27, 2025, he signed an executive order directing the U.S. Armed Forces to construct the system before the end of his term. The system is planned to employ a constellation of thousands of satellites equipped with interceptors, with data centers in space providing automated control through an AI network.
FCC accepts SpaceX filing for 1 million orbital data center plan
Space Force Gen. Michael Guetlein, director of the Golden Dome initiative, has described the software layer as a “glue layer” that would enable officers to manage and control radars, sensors, and missile batteries across services. The consortium is aiming to test the platform this summer.
Trump selected a design in May 2025 with a $175 billion price tag, expected to be operational by the end of his term in 2029, though the Congressional Budget Office projected the cost could reach $831 billion over two decades.
The Golden Dome role is only the latest in a string of military wins for SpaceX. As Teslarati reported, the U.S. Space Force awarded SpaceX a $178.5 million task order on April 1, 2026 to launch missile tracking satellites for the Space Development Agency, covering two Falcon 9 launches beginning in Q3 2027. That came on top of more than $22 billion in government contracts held by SpaceX as of 2024, per CEO Gwynne Shotwell, spanning NASA resupply missions, classified intelligence satellites through its Starshield program, and military broadband.
The accumulation of defense contracts, now including a seat at the table on the most expensive weapons program in U.S. history, positions SpaceX as the dominant infrastructure provider for American national security in space. With a SpaceX IPO still on the horizon, each new contract adds weight to what is already one of the most consequential companies in aerospace history, raising real questions about how much of America’s defense architecture will depend on a single private operator before it ever trades publicly.
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Tesla pulls back the curtain on Cybercab mass production
Tesla’s Cybercab drives itself off the Gigafactory Texas line in a striking new production video.
Tesla has provided a first look from inside a production Cybercab as it drove itself off the assembly line at Gigafactory Texas. The video footage, posted on X, opens on the factory floor with robotic arms and assembly equipment visible through the Cybercab windshield, and follows the car through a branded tunnel marked “Cybercab”, before autonomously navigating itself to a holding lot.
The first Cybercab rolled off the Giga Texas production line on February 17, 2026, with Musk writing on X, “Congratulations to the Tesla team on making the first production Cybercab.” April marked the official shift to volume production. The Giga Texas line is being prepared to produce hundreds of units per week, with 60 units already spotted on the Gigafactory campus earlier this month.
Purpose-built for autonomy
Cybercab in production now at Giga Texas pic.twitter.com/Y9qG3KyWBa
— Tesla (@Tesla) April 23, 2026
The Cybercab was first revealed publicly at Tesla’s “We, Robot” event in October 2024 at Warner Bros. Studios in Burbank, California, where 20 pre-production units gave attendees rides around the studio lot. Musk said he believed the average operating cost would be around $0.20 per mile, and that buyers would be able to purchase one for under $30,000. The two-seat design is deliberate. Musk noted that 90 percent of miles driven involve one or two people, making a compact two-passenger vehicle the most efficient configuration for a fleet-scale robotaxi. Eliminating rear seats also removes complexity and cost, supporting that sub-$30,000 target.
Tesla’s annual production goal is 2 million Cybercabs per year once several factories reach full design capacity. The Cybercab has no steering wheel, no pedals, and relies entirely on Tesla’s vision-based FSD system. What the video shows is the first evidence of that system working not as a demo, but as a production reality, driving itself off the line and into the world.
🚗 Our first ride in Tesla Cybercab last October: pic.twitter.com/kGqIqgJPRn https://t.co/BITCXFhbVd
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) April 22, 2025
Elon Musk
Elon Musk talks Tesla Roadster’s future
Elon Musk confirmed the Roadster as Tesla’s last manually driven car, with a debut coming soon.
During Tesla’s Q1 2026 earnings call on April 22, Elon Musk made a brief but notable comment about the long-awaited next generation Roadster while describing Tesla’s future vehicle lineup. “Long term, the only manually driven car will be the new Tesla Roadster,” he said. “Speaking of which, we may be able to debut that in a month or so. It requires a lot of testing and validation before we can actually have a demo and not have something go wrong with the demo.”
That single statement is the entire Roadster update from yesterday’s call, and while it represents another timeline shift, it comes as no surprise with Tesla heads-down-at-work on the mass rollout of its Robotaxi service across US cities, and the industrial scale production of the humanoid Optimus.
The fact that Musk specifically framed the Roadster as the last manually driven Tesla is significant on its own. As the rest of the lineup moves toward full autonomy, the Roadster becomes something rare in the Tesla-sphere by keeping the driver in control. Driving enthusiasts who buy a $200,000 supercar are not doing so to be passengers. They want the physical connection to the road, the feel of acceleration under their own input, and the experience of controlling something with that level of performance. FSD, however capable it becomes, removes that entirely. The Roadster signals that Tesla understands this distinction and is building a car specifically for the people who consider driving itself the point.
Tesla isn’t joking about building Optimus at an industrial scale: Here we go
The specs for the Roadster Musk has teased over the years are genuinely unlike anything in production. The base model targets 0 to 60 mph in 1.9 seconds, a top speed above 250 mph, and up to 620 miles of range from a 200 kWh battery. The optional SpaceX package takes it further, rumored to add roughly ten cold gas thrusters operating at 10,000 psi, borrowed directly from Falcon 9 rocket technology. With thrusters, Musk has claimed 0 to 60 mph in as little as 1.1 seconds. In a 2021 Joe Rogan interview he went further, stating “I want it to hover. We got to figure out how to make it hover without killing people.” Tesla filed a patent for ground effect technology in August 2025, suggesting the hover concept has not been abandoned. The starting price remains $200,000, with the Founders Series requiring a $250,000 full deposit. Some reservation holders placed those deposits in 2017 and are approaching a full decade of waiting.
With production now targeted for 2027 or 2028 at the earliest, the Roadster remains Tesla’s most audacious promise and its longest-running delay. But if what Musk is testing lives up to even half of what he has described, the demo alone should be worth waiting for.
Elon Musk says the Tesla Roadster unveiling could be done “maybe in a month or so.”
He said it should be an extraordinary unveiling event. pic.twitter.com/6V9P7zmvEm
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) April 22, 2026
SpaceX just got pulled into the biggest Weapons Program in U.S. history
Tesla pulls back the curtain on Cybercab mass production
