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SpaceX’s next Falcon Heavy begins to arrive at 39A as center core heads to TX
Approximately a week after a Falcon Heavy side booster – the first of two – arrived at SpaceX’s LC-39A launch complex, a sign of late-stage preparation for the massive rocket’s second and third launches, a Falcon Heavy center stage was spotted rolling through the Waco, Texas locale on its way to SpaceX’s McGregor testing facilities.
Signified by the outlines of unusual bumps under the Falcon booster’s protective shrink wrap, this probable Falcon Heavy center core’s Texas arrival indicates that SpaceX has most likely completed static fire testing of both side boosters, with the second booster now likely to depart McGregor and/or arrive at SpaceX’s Florida facilities in the coming weeks.
The first component of Falcon Heavy Block 5 has arrived at HLC-39A! https://t.co/38spGaCps9
— Thomas Burghardt (@TGMetsFan98) December 22, 2018
In February 2018, Falcon Heavy took flight for the first time ever, bringing to an end an almost mythical series of delays that pushed the rocket’s debut back more than five years. Aside from the unintentional demise of Falcon Heavy Flight 1’s center core, the inaugural launch was a spectacular and technologically valuable success, perfectly verifying the rocket’s ability to safely ignite, launch, separate, and recover two Falcon 9-class boosters simultaneously. SpaceX also took the opportunity – a payload with no practical value aside from inspiration – to perform a successful six-hour coast of the Falcon upper stage, demonstrating a capability critical for many potentially valuable launch contracts.
Now verified by planning schedules, SpaceX plans to attempt a truly impressive feat in the first half of 2019. Assuming all goes well during the center booster’s static fire and the subsequent integration and static fire of all three first stages, the company intends to launch the same Falcon Heavy hardware (all three boosters) twice in as little as two months, currently tentatively penciled in for February/March and April 2019.
Surprise sighting of a #SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket booster in my hometown headed a few minutes down the road to the McGregor, TX test site. First time in years seeing a booster in transit “in the wild” like this. 🚀 @elonmusk #falcon9 #falconheavy #STEM #bfr #space pic.twitter.com/daEz4NZPi5
— Abby Garrett (@abbygarrettart) January 1, 2019
Corroborated a few weeks ago by a NASA official involved in one of the payloads that will be present on that planned April launch, SpaceX plans to attempt recovery of both the side boosters and center core and rapidly refurbish them after their first launch in February or March, nominally placing the 6000 kg (~13,200 lb) Arabsat 6A satellite into a high-energy orbit. Perhaps as few as 4-8 weeks later, the rocket will be reintegrated, perform a second static fire at Pad 39A, and launch once again with a USAF rideshare known as Space Test Program (STP) 2, a program specifically designed to allow the Air Force to support low-risk test launches of unproven rockets.
Even more so than the fact that an ~8-week Falcon Heavy turnaround would simultaneously break SpaceX’s previous booster turnaround record in triplicate, the biggest reason to be skeptical of these plans is the fact that this schedule appears to require that the USAF fly a mission on not one but three flight-proven Falcon boosters. This stands at odds with the military branch’s unwillingness (by all appearances) to so much as allow a brand new Falcon 9 enough propellant margin (typically just a few percent) to land itself after the December 23rd launch of GPS III SV01, let alone allow their satellites to ride on a previously-flown rocket.
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- Falcon Heavy is composed of a Falcon 9 upper stage and three Falcon 9-class boosters. (SpaceX)
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- Falcon Heavy’s simultaneous side booster recovery. This will likely be repeated for both Arabsat 6A and STP-2. (SpaceX)
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- The communications satellite Arabsat-6A. (Lockheed Martin)
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- The USAF’s STP-2, a combination of a few dozen different satellites. (USAF)
The major wrench in the machine here is the fact that GPS III SV01 most likely cost the USAF upwards of $700M to procure and will ultimately become a critical part of a widespread infrastructural upgrade, whereas STP-2 features two dozen or so small satellites worth dramatically less than the single GPS satellite SpaceX launched last month. STP-2 also operates under a program that is in large part meant to offer opportunities for new or wholly unproven launch vehicles (like Falcon Heavy) to conduct experimental launches, carrying the assumption that certifying those rockets for national security space (NSS) missions would be in the best interests of the Air Force and DoD.
As such, the back-to-back Falcon Heavy launch schedule is by no means impossible despite the fact that it offers up many reasons to doubt its plausibility. Either way, the fact that the next Falcon Heavy’s center core has already left SpaceX’s Hawthorne factory – following in the footsteps of two new side boosters – is a nearly unequivocal sign that the rocket’s second launch rapidly approaching.
For prompt updates, on-the-ground perspectives, and unique glimpses of SpaceX’s rocket recovery fleet check out our brand new LaunchPad and LandingZone newsletters!
Tesla’s Head of AI, Ashok Elluswamy, says that something that was expected with version 14.3 of the company’s Full Self-Driving platform has already partially shipped with the current build of version 14.2.
Tesla and CEO Elon Musk have teased on several occasions that reasoning will be a big piece of future Full Self-Driving builds, helping bring forth the “sentient” narrative that the company has pushed for these more advanced FSD versions.
Back in October on the Q3 Earnings Call, Musk said:
“With reasoning, it’s literally going to think about which parking spot to pick. It’ll drop you off at the entrance of the store, then go find a parking spot. It’s going to spot empty spots much better than a human. It’s going to use reasoning to solve things.”
Musk said in the same month:
“By v14.3, your car will feel like it is sentient.”
Amazingly, Tesla Full Self-Driving v14.2.2.2, which is the most recent iteration released, is very close to this sentient feeling. However, there are more things that need to be improved, and logic appears to be in the future plans to help with decision-making in general, alongside other refinements and features.
On Thursday evening, Elluswamy revealed that some of the reasoning features have already been rolled out, confirming that it has been added to navigation route changes during construction, as well as with parking options.
He added that “more and more reasoning will ship in Q1.”
🚨 Tesla’s Ashok Elluswamy reveals Nav decisions when encountering construction and parking options contain “some elements of reasoning”
More uses of reasoning will be shipped later this quarter, a big tidbit of info as we wait v14.3 https://t.co/jty8llgsKM
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) January 9, 2026
Interestingly, parking improvements were hinted at being added in the initial rollout of v14.2 several months ago. These had not rolled out to vehicles quite yet, as they were listed under the future improvements portion of the release notes, but it appears things have already started to make their way to cars in a limited fashion.
Tesla Full Self-Driving v14.2 – Full Review, the Good and the Bad
As reasoning is more involved in more of the Full Self-Driving suite, it is likely we will see cars make better decisions in terms of routing and navigation, which is a big complaint of many owners (including me).
Additionally, the operation as a whole should be smoother and more comfortable to owners, which is hard to believe considering how good it is already. Nevertheless, there are absolutely improvements that need to be made before Tesla can introduce completely unsupervised FSD.
Elon Musk
Tesla’s Elon Musk: 10 billion miles needed for safe Unsupervised FSD
As per the CEO, roughly 10 billion miles of training data are required due to reality’s “super long tail of complexity.”
Tesla CEO Elon Musk has provided an updated estimate for the training data needed to achieve truly safe unsupervised Full Self-Driving (FSD).
As per the CEO, roughly 10 billion miles of training data are required due to reality’s “super long tail of complexity.”
10 billion miles of training data
Musk comment came as a reply to Apple and Rivian alum Paul Beisel, who posted an analysis on X about the gap between tech demonstrations and real-world products. In his post, Beisel highlighted Tesla’s data-driven lead in autonomy, and he also argued that it would not be easy for rivals to become a legitimate competitor to FSD quickly.
“The notion that someone can ‘catch up’ to this problem primarily through simulation and limited on-road exposure strikes me as deeply naive. This is not a demo problem. It is a scale, data, and iteration problem— and Tesla is already far, far down that road while others are just getting started,” Beisel wrote.
Musk responded to Beisel’s post, stating that “Roughly 10 billion miles of training data is needed to achieve safe unsupervised self-driving. Reality has a super long tail of complexity.” This is quite interesting considering that in his Master Plan Part Deux, Elon Musk estimated that worldwide regulatory approval for autonomous driving would require around 6 billion miles.
FSD’s total training miles
As 2025 came to a close, Tesla community members observed that FSD was already nearing 7 billion miles driven, with over 2.5 billion miles being from inner city roads. The 7-billion-mile mark was passed just a few days later. This suggests that Tesla is likely the company today with the most training data for its autonomous driving program.
The difficulties of achieving autonomy were referenced by Elon Musk recently, when he commented on Nvidia’s Alpamayo program. As per Musk, “they will find that it’s easy to get to 99% and then super hard to solve the long tail of the distribution.” These sentiments were echoed by Tesla VP for AI software Ashok Elluswamy, who also noted on X that “the long tail is sooo long, that most people can’t grasp it.”
News
Tesla earns top honors at MotorTrend’s SDV Innovator Awards
MotorTrend’s SDV Awards were presented during CES 2026 in Las Vegas.
Tesla emerged as one of the most recognized automakers at MotorTrend’s 2026 Software-Defined Vehicle (SDV) Innovator Awards.
As could be seen in a press release from the publication, two key Tesla employees were honored for their work on AI, autonomy, and vehicle software. MotorTrend’s SDV Awards were presented during CES 2026 in Las Vegas.
Tesla leaders and engineers recognized
The fourth annual SDV Innovator Awards celebrate pioneers and experts who are pushing the automotive industry deeper into software-driven development. Among the most notable honorees for this year was Ashok Elluswamy, Tesla’s Vice President of AI Software, who received a Pioneer Award for his role in advancing artificial intelligence and autonomy across the company’s vehicle lineup.
Tesla also secured recognition in the Expert category, with Lawson Fulton, a staff Autopilot machine learning engineer, honored for his contributions to Tesla’s driver-assistance and autonomous systems.
Tesla’s software-first strategy
While automakers like General Motors, Ford, and Rivian also received recognition, Tesla’s multiple awards stood out given the company’s outsized role in popularizing software-defined vehicles over the past decade. From frequent OTA updates to its data-driven approach to autonomy, Tesla has consistently treated vehicles as evolving software platforms rather than static products.
This has made Tesla’s vehicles very unique in their respective sectors, as they are arguably the only cars that objectively get better over time. This is especially true for vehicles that are loaded with the company’s Full Self-Driving system, which are getting progressively more intelligent and autonomous over time. The majority of Tesla’s updates to its vehicles are free as well, which is very much appreciated by customers worldwide.
Tesla AI Head says future FSD feature has already partially shipped
Tesla’s Elon Musk: 10 billion miles needed for safe Unsupervised FSD
