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NASA, SpaceX set for historic Friday astronaut launch with reused booster and capsule
Update: NASA and SpaceX have confirmed that they are set for a historic astronaut launch with a reused Falcon booster and Dragon capsule on Friday, April 23rd.
Delayed from April 22nd by weather hundreds to thousands of miles downrange, those sea conditions – appear to have settled down – at least for now – and weather at the launch pad itself is about as good as it gets on the central Florida coast.
An official livestream hosted by NASA and SpaceX will begin around four hours prior to Crew-2’s 5:49 am EDT (09:49 UTC) liftoff. Stay tuned for updates and tune in below around 1:49 am EDT to watch all of the launch proceedings live.
SpaceX’s second operational Dragon astronaut launch and one of the biggest milestones in the history of rocket and spacecraft reuse will have to wait until Friday after bad ‘abort’ weather tripped up an otherwise excellent Thursday launch attempt.
Aside from nature’s boundless chaos, all other elements of SpaceX and NASA’s Crew-2 astronaut launch are in excellent condition and ready for flight – now scheduled no earlier than 5:49 am EDT (09:49 UTC) on Friday, April 23rd.
As previously discussed on Teslarati, both Falcon 9’s first stage and Crew Dragon’s recoverable capsule are flight-proven, making Crew-2 the first time in history that a private company – or anyone, for that matter – has attempted to launch astronauts with a reused liquid rocket booster or flight-proven space capsule, let alone both at the same time.
“In essence, success would mean that SpaceX has unequivocally proven that a private company can develop – nearly from scratch – methods of rocket and spacecraft reusability that are so successful and reliable that perhaps the most risk-averse customer on Earth is willing to place the lives of its astronauts in the hands of those flight-proven spacecraft and rockets. If SpaceX can accomplish that feat with Falcon 9 and Crew Dragon, there is no practical reason to doubt that it can be repeated with Starship – a vehicle that has already piqued NASA’s interest.”
Teslarati.com – 15 April 2021
Thus far, both Falcon booster B1061 and Dragon capsule C206 have sailed through their prelaunch processing, most recently culminating in a flawless static fire test and ‘dry dress’ rehearsal late last week. Since then, NASA and SpaceX have continued to analyze data and inspect hardware but are otherwise simply waiting on the weather. Both on Thursday and Friday, weather at the pad itself (and in the region of the Atlantic where Falcon 9’s first stage will be landing) is about as good as it gets, offering just a 10-20% chance of conditions that could scrub the launch.
Unfortunately, things aren’t quite that easy. Due to the fact that NASA and SpaceX have to ensure that thorough contingency plans are in place in case of a launch failure and Dragon abort, Crew Dragon launches also have to take into account weather conditions and sea states across a ~3200-kilometer (~2000 mi) corridor stretching from the Central Florida coast to Ireland. With such a vast expanse of the ocean in focus, the odds that all possible abort scenarios will result in a safe splashdown and astronaut recovery start to become akin to winning the lottery.
In the case of Crew-2, the weather somewhere along that vast tract of the Atlantic Ocean isn’t behaving, leading NASA and SpaceX to delay the launch from Thursday to Friday. If Friday’s attempt suffers the same fate, orbital mechanics will push the next launch opportunity to Monday, April 26th. As always, SpaceX will stream the launch live. Tune in around four hours before liftoff at SpaceX.com.
News
Tesla rolls out xAI’s Grok to vehicles across Europe
The initial rollout includes the United Kingdom, Ireland, Germany, Switzerland, Austria, Italy, France, Portugal, and Spain.
Tesla is rolling out Grok to vehicles in Europe. The feature will initially launch in nine European territories.
In a post on X, the official Tesla Europe, Middle East & Africa account confirmed that Grok is coming to Teslas in Europe. The initial rollout includes the United Kingdom, Ireland, Germany, Switzerland, Austria, Italy, France, Portugal, and Spain, and additional markets are expected to be added later.
Grok allows drivers to ask questions using real-time information and interact hands-free while driving. According to Tesla’s support documentation, Grok can also initiate navigation commands, enabling users to search for destinations, discover points of interest, and adjust routes without touching the touchscreen, as per the feature’s official webpage.
The system offers selectable personalities, ranging from “Storyteller” to “Unhinged,” and is activated either through the App Launcher or by pressing and holding the steering wheel’s microphone button.
Grok is currently available only on Model S, Model 3, Model X, Model Y, and Cybertruck vehicles equipped with an AMD infotainment processor. Vehicles must be running software version 2025.26 or later, with navigation command support requiring version 2025.44.25 or newer.
Drivers must also have Premium Connectivity or a stable Wi-Fi connection to use the feature. Tesla notes that Grok does not currently replace standard voice commands for vehicle controls such as climate or media adjustments.
The company has stated that Grok interactions are processed securely by xAI and are not linked to individual drivers or vehicles. Users do not need a Grok account or subscription to enable the feature at this time as well.
News
Tesla ends Full Self-Driving purchase option in the U.S.
In January, Musk announced that Tesla would remove the ability to purchase the suite outright for $8,000. This would give the vehicle Full Self-Driving for its entire lifespan, but Tesla intended to move away from it, for several reasons, one being that a tranche in the CEO’s pay package requires 10 million active subscriptions of FSD.
Tesla has officially ended the option to purchase the Full Self-Driving suite outright, a move that was announced for the United States market in January by CEO Elon Musk.
The driver assistance suite is now exclusively available in the U.S. as a subscription, which is currently priced at $99 per month.
Tesla moved away from the outright purchase option in an effort to move more people to the subscription program, but there are concerns over its current price and the potential for it to rise.
In January, Musk announced that Tesla would remove the ability to purchase the suite outright for $8,000. This would give the vehicle Full Self-Driving for its entire lifespan, but Tesla intended to move away from it, for several reasons, one being that a tranche in the CEO’s pay package requires 10 million active subscriptions of FSD.
Although Tesla moved back the deadline in other countries, it has now taken effect in the U.S. on Sunday morning. Tesla updated its website to reflect this:
🚨 Tesla has officially moved the outright purchase option for FSD on its website pic.twitter.com/RZt1oIevB3
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) February 15, 2026
There are still some concerns regarding its price, as $99 per month is not where many consumers are hoping to see the subscription price stay.
Musk has said that as capabilities improve, the price will go up, but it seems unlikely that 10 million drivers will want to pay an extra $100 every month for the capability, even if it is extremely useful.
Instead, many owners and fans of the company are calling for Tesla to offer a different type of pricing platform. This includes a tiered-system that would let owners pick and choose the features they would want for varying prices, or even a daily, weekly, monthly, and annual pricing option, which would incentivize longer-term purchasing.
Although Musk and other Tesla are aware of FSD’s capabilities and state is is worth much more than its current price, there could be some merit in the idea of offering a price for Supervised FSD and another price for Unsupervised FSD when it becomes available.
Elon Musk
Musk bankers looking to trim xAI debt after SpaceX merger: report
xAI has built up $18 billion in debt over the past few years, with some of this being attributed to the purchase of social media platform Twitter (now X) and the creation of the AI development company. A new financing deal would help trim some of the financial burden that is currently present ahead of the plan to take SpaceX public sometime this year.
Elon Musk’s bankers are looking to trim the debt that xAI has taken on over the past few years, following the company’s merger with SpaceX, a new report from Bloomberg says.
xAI has built up $18 billion in debt over the past few years, with some of this being attributed to the purchase of social media platform Twitter (now X) and the creation of the AI development company. Bankers are trying to create some kind of financing plan that would trim “some of the heavy interest costs” that come with the debt.
The financing deal would help trim some of the financial burden that is currently present ahead of the plan to take SpaceX public sometime this year. Musk has essentially confirmed that SpaceX would be heading toward an IPO last month.
The report indicates that Morgan Stanley is expected to take the leading role in any financing plan, citing people familiar with the matter. Morgan Stanley, along with Goldman Sachs, Bank of America, and JPMorgan Chase & Co., are all expected to be in the lineup of banks leading SpaceX’s potential IPO.
Since Musk acquired X, he has also had what Bloomberg says is a “mixed track record with debt markets.” Since purchasing X a few years ago with a $12.5 billion financing package, X pays “tens of millions in interest payments every month.”
That debt is held by Bank of America, Barclays, Mitsubishi, UFJ Financial, BNP Paribas SA, Mizuho, and Société Générale SA.
X merged with xAI last March, which brought the valuation to $45 billion, including the debt.
SpaceX announced the merger with xAI earlier this month, a major move in Musk’s plan to alleviate Earth of necessary data centers and replace them with orbital options that will be lower cost:
“In the long term, space-based AI is obviously the only way to scale. To harness even a millionth of our Sun’s energy would require over a million times more energy than our civilization currently uses! The only logical solution, therefore, is to transport these resource-intensive efforts to a location with vast power and space. I mean, space is called “space” for a reason.”
The merger has many advantages, but one of the most crucial is that it positions the now-merged companies to fund broader goals, fueled by revenue from the Starlink expansion, potential IPO, and AI-driven applications that could accelerate the development of lunar bases.
Tesla rolls out xAI’s Grok to vehicles across Europe
Tesla ends Full Self-Driving purchase option in the U.S.
