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Falcon 9 B1051 and Crew Dragon rolled out to Pad 39A on February 28th, roughly 60 hours before launch. (NASA) Falcon 9 B1051 and Crew Dragon rolled out to Pad 39A on February 28th, roughly 60 hours before launch. (NASA)

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SpaceX’s first NASA astronaut launch could have historically small media presence

SpaceX and NASA's inaugural Crew Dragon astronaut launch could have an historically small media presence according to the space agency. (NASA)

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6 years ago

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NASA’s first SpaceX astronaut launch debut briefing suggests that the duo’s inaugural crewed flight to the International Space Station (ISS) could have an historically barebones media presence – if any at all.

On April 20th, NASA published its first routine preflight briefing for an astronaut launch to the space station, going over the basics of what to expect over the next few days and weeks. However, scheduled to launch no earlier than (NET) May 27th, SpaceX’s inaugural NASA astronaut launch is about as far from routine as it gets. Effectively a full decade (or more) in the making, SpaceX’s Crew Dragon Demonstration-2 mission will be the first crewed launch under NASA’s Commercial Crew Program (CCP) – an effort to replace the Space Shuttle with one or several domestic spacecraft.

Simultaneously, the world is currently under siege by one of the worst global pandemics in years. While NASA and SpaceX have done their absolute best to respond to the threat of the coronavirus and minimize its impact on critical launch operations like Demo-2, major operational changes and new restrictions have since been put in place. According to NASA’s first Demo-2 launch briefing, mainly focused on sketching out several upcoming press conferences and briefings, the space agency has revealed the first restrictions related to members of the press that typically attend and document both major and minor events.

SpaceX is perhaps just five weeks away from Crew Dragon’s inaugural NASA astronaut launch but the space agency’s first media briefing suggests that the event could be historically barren of press outlets. (SpaceX)

Over the last few days, NASA and SpaceX have revealed a wealth of new information about Crew Dragon’s upcoming astronaut launch debut, including the launch target (May 27th), a range of exceptional press briefings scheduled for May 1st, and even photos of both the Falcon 9 rocket and Crew Dragon spacecraft du jour.

Set to launch atop Falcon 9 B1058 and an expendable upper stage, Crew Dragon capsule C206 – pictured here on April 11th – will be the first US spacecraft to launch humans since 2011. (SpaceX)
Falcon 9 booster B1058 and a Falcon upper stage are pictured here at Pad 39A on April 1st, 2020. (SpaceX)

In its April 20th briefing, NASA revealed in no uncertain terms that “all media participation in these news conferences and interviews will be remote; no media will be accommodated at any NASA site due to the COVID-19 pandemic.” To be clear, NASA was referring to a trio of press conferences with NASA safety officials, managers, and SpaceX experts like Benji Reed (director of crew mission management) and COO and President Gwynne Shotwell.

In other words, absolutely zero members of the press will be allowed to attend those media briefings – scheduled just shy of four weeks before Crew Dragon’s planned launch. According to Brendan Byrne of WMFE Orlando, NASA reached out to add that it’s “trying to accommodate in-person reporting for [SpaceX’s inaugural astronaut] launch” but could make no guarantees come mid-to-late May.

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Coincidentally, Falcon 9 booster B1051 – responsible for successfully launching Crew Dragon on its inaugural orbital flight in March 2019 – is scheduled to launch for the fourth time as early as April 22nd. (NASA)

Unfortunately, this means that there is a strong chance – verging on certainty – that SpaceX and NASA’s inaugural Crew Dragon astronaut launch could have an almost unprecedentedly small contingent of press on site come late May. As far as the author is aware, every NASA astronaut launch since the very first one or two have included direct media access to the proceedings.

Given the growing severity of the COVID-19 pandemic, it would be far from shocking if NASA and SpaceX were forced to make history during preparations for the Demo-2 launch. Stay tuned for updates as we near the historic astronaut mission.

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Eric Ralph is Teslarati's senior spaceflight reporter and has been covering the industry in some capacity for almost half a decade, largely spurred in 2016 by a trip to Mexico to watch Elon Musk reveal SpaceX's plans for Mars in person. Aside from spreading interest and excitement about spaceflight far and wide, his primary goal is to cover humanity's ongoing efforts to expand beyond Earth to the Moon, Mars, and elsewhere.

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Tesla improves Dashcam playback with awesome addition

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2 hours ago

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June 2, 2026

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Image Credit: The Kilowatts/Twitter

Tesla has improved Dashcam playback with an awesome new addition, as the company has launched a web-based version that is potentially easier to navigate and operate.

The tool is available at dashcam.tesla.com and will be enabled as your vehicle receives the 2026.20 Software Version. Clips that are captured by your Tesla will be available on the Online Dashcam Clip Viewer once the files on your car’s storage drive are encrypted.

Not a Tesla App first noticed the new feature, and states that once your Tesla updates to 2026.20, the car will automatically protect the clips with an encryption key that is uniquely tied to your owner account.

The web-based viewer should be easier to operate for most. All you will do is head over to dashcam.tesla.com and log in using your account credentials.

Ensure your vehicle is updated to 2026.20 in order for the web-based viewer tool to fetch your vehicle’s saved dashcam clips.

Currently, only a small percentage of owners are updated to this, so it may be a couple of weeks until a majority of owners in the fleet are able to access this feature.

Watching Dashcam clips on the Tesla smartphone app is quick and convenient, as they can also be easily downloaded and stored right on your smartphone.

However, the clips are sometimes tougher to navigate, and in order to get details like self-driving activation, speed, and turn signals, owners have to screen record the Tesla app and crop out the rest of the screen.

It could also be a massive storage saver as you’ll be able to download the Dashcam clips from the online viewer and save them to your laptop, desktop, a flash drive, or even an external hard drive. This will keep all your clips in one place.

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Tesla Full Self-Driving attempts 150-mile stress test: the good and the bad

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5 hours ago

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June 2, 2026

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Credit: TESLARATI

I recently took my Tesla Model Y running Full Self-Driving (Supervised) v14.3.3 over 150 miles on the Pennsylvania Turnpike in an effort to truly put the system under a stress test. There were a lot of good moments, and some bad, but overall, Full Self-Driving impressed me.

Last Thursday, I decided it was time to visit the Flight 93 National Memorial near Shanksville, PA. I go a few times a year, and it was a beautiful day. Others have taken some pretty lengthy drives using FSD, but I haven’t had the opportunity to really do something lengthy in quite a few months on an older version. I decided it was the perfect opportunity to try some things out.

I recorded the entire ride there on a GoPro, edited to highlight the crucial moments, and shared them on our social media accounts. If you want to watch them, I’ll share them throughout the piece, but I did not get to do a real breakdown of what I felt about its performance.

Overall Thoughts

I realize it is probably better to do a summation of its performance toward the end of the piece, but I feel like it is also reasonable to lead with this because I was overly impressed with how well it handled everything. The only moments where I felt a little bit of reason to touch the wheel, at least while traveling on the Turnpike and Rt. 30, were due to other drivers and their behaviors.

I have taken many drives to the Memorial over the past several years, and although it’s not incredibly long, it is a tiring drive. It’s about five hours both ways, close to 300 miles, and I think most of the exhaustion comes from the toll of sitting in the car and then visiting something that is pretty heavy to take in.

This was the first time I’ve ever taken the ride and not felt like I needed to avoid my vehicle after I got home. In the past, I could not even think about driving after I finally arrived at my house, but this was simply different.

It was nice to have something else take the drive for me, while I still had the freedom to take over if I chose to. It made the entire trip more enjoyable.

Full Self-Driving Recognizes Lane-Ending Arrows on Road

After traveling in the fast lane for a little while, FSD noticed the arrows on the road indicating the lane was coming to an end ahead. The car was also in the process of making a pass on a slower vehicle in the middle lane, but aborted this maneuver and backed off to get behind the vehicle.

I was really impressed by this because I thought that the car would absolutely try to make the pass, only to get in front of the other car, and then slow back down to 75 MPH:

Full Self-Driving Notices Veering Tractor Trailer, Adjusts Lane Positioning

My two rules of the road are never cruise in the fast lane and never drive next to a tractor-trailer. This clip is a perfect example as to why.

FSD v14.3.3 recognized this tractor-trailer attempting to change lanes while we were still next to it. The car shifted its lane positioning to the shoulder slightly to make room for the merging semi, executed the pass safely, and on we went.

I will admit this one made me a little nervous, but more so because of the 18-wheeler, and not because of the Tesla:

Full Self-Driving Follows the Rules of Tunnel Travel

Many people who are not familiar with Full Self-Driving and its capabilities are pretty limited in what they know about the really simple things it does well. Part of supervising FSD is being aware of things it might make mistakes with, and anticipating maneuvers it might want to make at the wrong time.

Entering the Blue Mountain Tunnel on the Turnpike, I was ready for FSD to attempt to get back into the right lane after making a pass on a tractor-trailer, but I was pleasantly surprised. Several signs outside the tunnel advise drivers to stay in the lane they’ve chosen while driving through the tunnel; this eliminates the possibility of an accident caused by lane changes, which would impede traffic on a crucial logistics route.

I was happy to see that Tesla Full Self-Driving v14.3.3 did not make this mistake:

Full Self-Driving Navigates Toll Plazas with Ease

I was interested to see how FSD would handle toll plazas, including the speed at which it would travel through them, and whether it would stop on the Turnpike at these booths, which have since been transitioned to a “Toll by Plate” system, which mails you a bill.

It was flawless:

Full Self-Driving Still Struggles with Parking from Time to Time

Since I took delivery in late August, I’ve never had a single instance of my Tesla struggling to park at a Supercharger. Other spots at the mall, market, or gym are another story.

This was the first time it did such a terrible job of backing into a spot. This required me to take over and manually park at another charger:

Full Self-Driving Gets Confused After Arriving at Its Destination

This was the first time I have ever experienced FSD getting confused and just circling the lot. The navigation continued to reroute to try to resolve the issue, but after four laps, I decided it was time to overtake the car’s controls and park manually:

This was a baffling behavior that I truly couldn’t explain. Other owners communicated that they have also experienced this issue.

Final Thoughts

I am so incredibly impressed by FSD that it has really made traveling stress-free. The two issues related to parking were not ideal, but to be fair, I usually take over when arriving at parking lots. However, this shortcoming is something Tesla has to make some serious progress with, because parking has truly stumped FSD at times.

Solving that will be a major breakthrough for autonomy, but Tesla has struggled with it for some time.

All in all, FSD v14.3.3 is unbelievably accurate and handles many of the more stressful maneuvers with ease, one of them being avoiding merging traffic on highways, which was shown above.

Some things that would be great to see improvements on are parking, Speed Profiles, which are relatively tough to adjust (I stayed in Standard for the duration of this drive), and, of course, navigation.

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SpaceX’s amended S-1 is sparking a major Tesla merger conversation

A single line in SpaceX’s amended S-1 just sent Tesla stock down 5% in one day.

Published

18 hours ago

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June 1, 2026

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A single line buried in SpaceX’s amended S-1 filing is doing more to move Tesla’s stock price than anything Tesla itself has announced in months. The clause, disclosed as SpaceX prepares for what could be the largest IPO in Wall Street history, states that the company “may issue a significant amount of equity in connection with future transactions.” While this may be seen as boilerplate language in S-1 filings, the historical ties between SpaceX and Tesla, and with Elon Musk reportedly discussing a possible merger with close colleagues, investors are interpreting it as something closer to a signal.

The concern among institutional investors like Gary Black, managing director of The Future Fund, pointed directly to the amended filing on X, saying it “strongly suggests more SPCX equity will be issued,” which could potentially be used to acquire Tesla. He estimated such a deal could be 28% dilutive to Tesla shareholders since SpaceX would likely command a significantly higher valuation multiple. Black added that institutional investors he knows hate the idea of a combination because they prefer pure plays over conglomerates, which he said “nearly always gravitate to the lowest common multiple.”

The Tesla and SpaceX merger everyone is talking about is quietly building

The bull case runs the math differently. Tesla influencer and retail shareholder advocate AleXandra Merz pushed back on what she called a widespread misunderstanding of how merger-of-equals deals actually work. Rather than simply splitting the difference between two market caps, a merger exchange ratio is negotiated based on relative fair market values, meaning the lower valued company typically sees its stock reprice upward toward the deal value.

Under her model, SpaceX enters at a $2.5 trillion valuation and Tesla at $1.6 trillion, producing a combined entity worth $4.1 trillion split evenly between both shareholder groups. That implies Tesla’s side of the deal would be valued at $2.05 trillion, a gain of roughly $450 billion from its current market cap. She cited Dow-DuPont and CBS-Viacom as historical examples of how markets reprice both companies toward the announced exchange ratio after a deal is unveiled.


The SpaceX S-1 amendments also revealed just how much financial infrastructure already binds the two companies together. As Teslarati has reported, SpaceX purchased $697 million in Tesla Megapacks, $131 million in Cybertrucks, and the two companies have shared supply chain resources, and semiconductor fabrication plans since well before any merger conversation became public. A retail poll by Tesla influencer Sawyer Merritt is finding that 36% of respondents do not plan to buy SpaceX shares at IPO and 15.3% saying their decision depends on the valuation.


Whether the merger happens or not, the amended filing is seemingly moving markets and sharpened a debate that is no longer theoretical. SpaceX is weeks away from trading publicly, and Tesla shareholders are now watching every word of every filing for clues about what Musk plans to do next.

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