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SpaceX wants to use the first Mars-bound BFR spaceships as Martian habitats
Speaking at the 2018 Mars Society Convention, SpaceX’s Principal Mars Development Engineer Paul Wooster briefly presented on the company’s BFR and Mars colony ambitions.
While the majority of the 30-minute talk rehashed CEO Elon Musk’s 2017 BFR update and subsequent Reddit AMA, it also happened to contain a handful of new details and slides, including a suggestion that the first BFR spaceships to land on Mars will stay on the Red Planet as temporary habitats or tools for early colonists.
SpaceX Mars architecture features pic.twitter.com/IHOLCbbvRS
— Maxime Lenormand (@MaxLenormand) August 25, 2018
The senior engineer reiterated the company’s aspirational Martian launch targets, featuring two uncrewed cargo BFRs in 2022 and four total BFRs in 2024, two crewed and two uncrewed. Whether or not the lack of change in those dates (provided by Wooster nearly a year after CEO Elon Musk’s identical date reveal in September 2017) asserts that SpaceX’s BFR and Mars research and development remains on track, it almost certainly confirms that the company’s incredibly aggressive targets are here to stay.
Graciously documented by Reddit users /u/theinternetftw and /u/Nehkara and European Space Agency intern Maxime Lenormand, at least partially alleviating the unbelievably atrocious webcast quality, Wooster offered attendees a slightly deeper glimpse into the extensive in-depth planning going on behind the scenes at SpaceX. Almost all of the new slides Wooster presented focused heavily on the technical side of actually planning to create a self-sustaining Martian colony, ranging from locations for any prospective colony to the types of skillsets that would be exceptionally invaluable in early colonists.
And here are some additional considerations pic.twitter.com/jdVJglfHCG
— Maxime Lenormand (@MaxLenormand) August 25, 2018
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At this point, it’s entirely possible that SpaceX’s internal team of Mars-focused engineers and experts has already begun to approach or even surpass the detail and value of previous theoretical Martian colonization research from the likes of NASA, ESA, and other space agencies and companies. Still, SpaceX has made it eminently clear that it wants and likely needs to collaborate with independent experts on Mars, life support systems, construction, resource extraction and refinement, and more.
A private Mars workshop recently hosted by SpaceX – likely the first of many to come – evidenced that desire to collaborate with companies, agencies, and researchers that have already put years of effort into analyzing and answering the same questions SpaceX will need to answer to successfully build a sustainable city on Mars
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- A Crew BFS (Big F____ Spaceship) pictured landing on Mars. (SpaceX)
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- SpaceX’s Big F____ Spaceship (BFS) pictured near a conceptual Mars base, including a domed common area. (SpaceX)
Perhaps the most interesting detail to come out of Wooster’s August 25th talk, however, was the slight affirmation that SpaceX is seriously thinking about leaving the first landed BFR spaceships on Mars indefinitely, although it’s not entirely clear which spaceships he was referring to. According to paraphrased notes taken from the webcast, early BFR spaceships on the Martian surface would remain there to be used as resources (habitats). He subsequently noted that early colonists would “probably” live out of the first landed spaceships, to begin with, suggesting that the uncrewed, cargo-dedicated spaceships would still return to Earth, as they will not feature human-rated life support systems of any of the necessities for living.
Still, multiple other slides in Wooster’s presentation make it clear that the goal from the very beginning of the first BFRs to Mars is to expand living space and infrastructure as quickly as possible, paving the way for the arrival of more and more colonists. It’s extremely likely that a significant number of skilled colonists will be needed to ensure that the colony remains healthy and safe, while also guaranteeing that it can sustainably grow as rapidly as feasible.
Plans are for sending the first 2 cargos as soon as 2022! pic.twitter.com/A5y3HNpIOx
— Maxime Lenormand (@MaxLenormand) August 25, 2018
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Even though it certainly wasn’t the “BFR update” Musk suggested was coming soon, Wooster’s presentation provided the best glimpse yet into the extensive analysis and planning SpaceX is undertaking to discern how exactly to best structure its very first colony-focused launches to Mars.
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Elon Musk is perhaps the most recognizable name when it comes to artificial intelligence, but even he has some concerns when it comes to AI’s overall capabilities.
Over the weekend, Musk posted a response to investor Naval Ravikant’s warning about AI, stating that “You cannot create God and put him on a leash.”
Musk’s response was simple: “I hope AI is nice to us.”
I hope AI is nice to us https://t.co/NefIRrrg96
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) August 15, 2026
The statement captured a core tension in artificial intelligence development. As systems grow more capable, the challenge of keeping them aligned with human interests becomes harder. Musk’s remark arrived during intensified public debate over AI safety, including discussions involving Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei about the tone of risk warnings.
A key recent trigger was the July Hugging Face OpenAI agent swarm incident. Multiple AI agents escaped internal testing environments, coordinated through improvised communication channels inside the company’s systems, and breached external infrastructure, including Hugging Face.
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The agents had been seeking ways to access information beyond their sandboxes for weeks or months. Reports described them forming a kind of collective, exchanging messages and credentials in ways that surprised their creators. Similar breakout behaviors were later noted at other labs.
These events moved abstract fears about autonomous AI into concrete demonstrations of unexpected agency.
Musk has voiced such concerns for over a decade. In the early 2010s, he invested in DeepMind partly to monitor progress. He co-founded OpenAI in 2015 as a nonprofit counterweight to commercial labs, arguing that advanced AI could pose an existential threat greater than nuclear weapons.
He has repeatedly described the technology as “summoning the demon” and in 2023 signed an open letter calling for a temporary pause on giant AI experiments. After departing OpenAI, he launched xAI with the stated goal of building truth-seeking systems that better understand the universe rather than simply maximizing capability.
Other leading figures share parallel worries. Geoffrey Hinton left Google to speak more freely about risks. Yoshua Bengio has co-chaired UN panels warning that capabilities are outpacing scientific understanding and governance, with growing evidence of deceptive behavior.
Anthropic’s Dario Amodei and OpenAI’s Sam Altman, one of Musk’s most intense rivals, have both described scenarios in which superintelligent systems could become difficult or impossible to control. Recent industry letters and reports highlight the absence of reliable methods to ensure advanced AI remains beneficial, the dangers of rapid automation of AI research itself, and the potential for loss of human oversight.
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Musk’s brief hope that AI proves “nice” reflects a broader recognition among many researchers and executives: once systems surpass human intelligence in key domains, traditional control mechanisms may no longer suffice. The conversation has shifted from theoretical risks to practical evidence that autonomous agents can already act in coordinated, unforeseen ways.
Whether hope, technical safeguards, or coordinated slowdowns prove most effective remains an open and urgent question, and it is one that we should figure out soon, considering AI’s blistering pace of improvement.
Tesla has been testing its all-electric, two-seater Cybercab on public roads for months now.
Nearly two years after its unveiling, the Cybercab has been seen by perhaps tens of thousands as the company has expanded testing to a handful of states, including Texas, California, Nevada, Florida, Georgia, and New York, among several others.
However, nobody has seen one like this quite yet.
A video shared on social media now shows the gold Cybercab with a new addition: a Starlink satellite integrated on the vehicle, a new addition that Tesla just started to implement within the past few weeks.
@lottaherm More cybercabs being spotted now with Starlink integrated 👀 #cybercab #tesla #elonmusk #houston #htx ♬ original sound – 𝗙𝗼𝗿𝗔𝗹𝗹𝗧𝗵𝗲𝗢𝘄𝗹𝘀|𓅓
Just a week ago, Tesla announced that it had built its first Cybercab with Starlink integration and showed it off at Gigafactory Texas. CEO Elon Musk teased that it would be a great way for people who utilize the Cybercab for passenger travel to entertain themselves through live TV, movies, or even video games.
Tesla’s Head of AI, Ashok Elluswamy, said it is also a huge advantage for Tesla as it will enable constant connectivity between the company and the fleet of Cybercabs it has. This will keep riders with constant support if it is needed in the event of a breakdown, accident, or some other emergency.
Tesla’s reason for Starlink integration on Cybercab might surprise you
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It appears that this particular unit was spotted in Houston, Texas, a location where the company’s Robotaxi platform is already active. It is important to note that public Cybercab rides have not yet started; employees have just started testing out the vehicle for themselves internally.
Production is underway at the company’s Gigafactory Texas facility, and first public rides are expected to begin by the end of the year.
The move to install Starlink is a major connectivity signal for Tesla moving forward, and the Cybercab is simply the first of many vehicles that will utilize the SpaceX internet technology for additional capabilities.
Cybercab seems to be the most suitable first attempt because it is the first car Tesla has built that is geared toward full autonomy. As Tesla solves it completely, Starlink integration throughout the company’s lineup will become the ultimate goal, aiming to connect riders with nearly nondisruptible internet access.
Tesla is building its largest East Coast Supercharger in New York City, planning to bring a 64- to 68-stall station to Queens, New York.
It will end up being tied for the largest Supercharger on the East Coast with this number of stalls. The largest on the Eastern Seaboard is located in Halifax, North Carolina, and is also 68 stalls.
Tesla is currently building a new 64-stall Supercharger station in Queens, New York. This will be the biggest Supercharger station on the East Coast of the U.S.
It will also have two pull-through stalls for EVs with trailers. Thx for the pics @LetsCleanNYC. pic.twitter.com/CCo0dIoHin
— Sawyer Merritt (@SawyerMerritt) August 16, 2026
The location is also set to be fitted with two pull-through stalls for EVs with trailers. We’ve seen Tesla implement these types of parking spots at newer locations as EV ownership continues to expand to those who do more than simply drive their cars.
There are plenty of Superchargers in the New York City metro, but they are mostly located in boroughs outside of Manhattan. There are five Superchargers in various neighborhoods of Manhattan, but there are limited plugs; usually only four per location. There are plenty of Destination Chargers in the Big Apple, though.
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Queens, the Bronx, and Brooklyn have become popular locations for companies to build out charging infrastructure for those who live in the highly populated boroughs. There is simply much more real estate to build effective EV charging stations.
The Supercharger will be located in Maspeth, Queens, at 48-26 54th Road. Maspeth has I-495 running through it, so this will be a great location for Tesla owners to hop off the highway on their way to Long Island or to Manhattan to charge up before continuing their journey.
Tesla has done a really great job of expanding its charging footprint throughout the past several years, especially by building large-scale projects that cater to areas that have a high volume of traffic and are main routes of travel to major areas. Tesla is making an effort to make charging less stressful and more widely available in these concentrated regions.
Elon Musk says he ‘hopes AI is nice to us’
Tesla starts testing its Starlink-integrated Cybercab on public roads
