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SpaceX’s Florida Starship shown off in aerial footage as Texas prototype grows rapidly
Local amateur photographer and spaceflight fan Michael Tapes has graciously shared a new aerial view of SpaceX’s Florida Starship facility, where dozens of workers can be seen buzzing around what is hoped to become the first orbital-class prototype of the massive spaceship and upper stage.
Tapes’ aerial footage offers a unique look at the layout of SpaceX’s Florida site as of July 9th, illustrating just how active and expansive it is. Some workers can be seen building something (perhaps preparing a new worksite) under a large, white tent, while another group surveys two large Starship segments and a third works to prepare new stainless steel ring sections. Of note, those two large Starship segments appear to be bereft of any obvious activity, perhaps a consequence of a fire that caused about $100,000 in damage the day prior (July 8th).
In fact, the shipping container that took what looks like the entirety of fire-related damage is visible on the west side of the SpaceX facility’s main hangar. Workers could be seen heading inside the extremely scorched container, likely removing debris, cleaning up the site of the incident, and preparing to scrap the damaged container itself.
Thankfully, nobody was injured by the fire and ~$100K of damage is certainly an inconvenience but is definitely nothing more for a multibillion-dollar company like SpaceX. Given that dozens of vehicles are visible in the parking lot, it’s safe to say that tons of work is ongoing under the roofs of the site’s many covered buildings, potentially designing Starship/Super Heavy, working on the rocket’s first orbital-class thrust structures, building new steel ring segments, and much more. With any luck, work on orbital Starship assembly and integration has already resumed following the small July 8th fire.
Star(ship) Wars
Speaking of that work, prior to the last week or so of progress on SpaceX South Texas’ own orbital Starship prototype, both Florida and Texas appeared to be more or less tied with two large Starship segments each and various other 9m-diameter subsections spread around their respective facilities. Impressively, Boca Chica has been marked by a flurry of recent work as multiple in-process steel rings were stacked on top of the Texas Starship’s propulsion and tankage section.
In just the last two weeks of June, workers thus pushed through the brutal South Texas heat and humidity to stack three new sections of fuselage, literally doubling the height of Boca Chica’s (hopefully) orbital-class Starship prototype in a dozen or so days. The ship’s conical nose section continues to be polished, while some sort of additional work is likely going on inside, away from public view. It’s hard to get a good overhead view but it’s safe to assume that – in the large barrel sections both in Florida and Texas – technicians are working to install (or at least prepare for) stainless steel tank domes, one of the last major finishing touches for spacecraft’s tank sections.
A huge amount of work remains for both sites but the visible progress as new ship segments are stacked and welded together is undeniably cathartic and satisfying. Working 10-12 hour shifts exposed to the Texas and Florida summer sun, heat, and wildlife is in no uncertain terms bound to be a hellish experience, but at least the hard work is so obviously producing results.
The most exciting kind of grass-watching
Back in Florida, several additional Starship barrel sections are in various stages of work, at least two of which appear to be nearly ready for stacking atop the propellant tank section already being assembled. Meanwhile, propellant tank domes were spotted in different stages of fabrication inside the Florida facility’s main hangar-cum-production-line, awaiting their turn to leave the building and prepare for installation on Starship East.
All said and done, once those visible segments are installed, Starship East will (at least by appearances) be neck and neck with its Texas sibling once more. In reality, there is likely no actual race between the two sites and they are reportedly sharing any critical discoveries and lessons-learned. Nevertheless, humans are notoriously competitive and one can only begin to imagine the (hopefully friendly) rivalry forming between the geographically distinct teams.
At the same time, SpaceX’s Florida team has several home-field advantages, so to speak, owing to their proximity to the several hundred SpaceXers working at the company’s Florida launch facilities and recovery fleet. Additionally, Florida’s Starship facility is just a few dozen miles away from SpaceX’s Kennedy Space Center Pad 39A, the most likely site of Starship’s (and Super Heavy’s) first suborbital and orbital launch attempts.
At the end of the day, a little friendly internal competition and – more so – a literal Starship A/B test are bound to be a huge benefit for SpaceX’s next-gen launch vehicle program, significantly increasing the speed at which the company can make mistakes, solve problems, and get Starship ready for orbit.
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Sweden’s IF Metall union has announced that it is ending all protests against Tesla, effective immediately.
The union said in a statement this morning:
“There seems to be no limits to the length Tesla would go to keep unions out of their operations. Unfortunately, they have managed to pay their way out in Sweden. At least that has given the former IF Metall members more money in their pocket, but the insecurity of not having a union or a collective agreement still remains.”
IF Metall has been after Tesla in Sweden for the past three years, attempting to push unionized operations into its factories. Tesla, on the other hand, has given its employees the chance to unionize in various markets. However, the organization says that Tesla has “bought out all of its striking members.”
🚨 NEW: IF Metall has decided to end all industrial action against Tesla in Sweden, effective immediately.
“IF Metall has decided to end all industrial action against Tesla’s Swedish operations, after the company bought out all of its striking members. With no members remaining… pic.twitter.com/blne8iC6hV
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) August 13, 2026
“Today, we end our industrial action against Tesla. We do so because it can no longer have an effect – not because our principles have changed,” a written statement said.
Over the past three years, IF Metall has definitely been a thorn in the side of Tesla and its operations in Sweden. The primary strike started in October 2023, when IF Metall members at Tesla’s Swedish Service Centers refused to work.
IF Metall chair to Elon Musk: “Give us a chance” as Tesla Sweden strike hits 2 years
Strikes extended to blockades and work stoppages at non-Tesla-owned repair shops that service Teslas. This limited and stopped anything related to warranties, transport damage, and other work on Teslas ending, eliminating work arounds for customers.
Sympathy strikes followed, as postal workers, dock workers, electricians, and other tradesmen stopped working. Add in lawsuits and other pressures, and you get the full scope of what strategies the union has used against Tesla over the past several years.
But now, it’s all over.
“We will continue to defend the right of workers to organize. We will continue to fight for collective bargaining. And we will continue to stand in solidarity with workers and trade unions facing similar challenges elsewhere – just as you have stood with us,” IF Metall said.
Tesla CEO Elon Musk said that flying cars will be coming to the market, something that his own company has hinted at previously.
Musk said on X, in response to a post that read, “We were promised flying cars and all we got is infinite superintelligence for everyone,” “You will get flying cars.”
You will get flying cars
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) August 12, 2026
The post rang back to when Musk teased flying and hovering capabilities for the Tesla Roadster, the company’s supercar that has been delayed more times than anyone cares to count. It was set for an unveiling earlier this year, but it was then pushed back to August. There is still no sign of it coming.
However, that does not mean it won’t. But one of the biggest features of the Roadster that was teased was a SpaceX package that featured cold gas thrusters on the rear end that would help with white-knuckle acceleration. Another set would face the ground and would help the Roadster gain small bits of altitude, potentially helpful to jump over obstacles.
Elon Musk hints at Tesla Roadster’s “hovering” abilities in SpaceX package
But it is not a straightforward thing for Musk. As a serial entrepreneur, he tends to spend his time on major disruptors; currently, his largest projects are artificial intelligence and compute power, as well as SpaceX’s launches that will eventually make life multiplanetary.
In the past, he has been critical of flying cars and has been in favor of tunnels, one of the big reasons he started the Boring Company. In 2017 at a TED talk, he said:
“There is a challenge with flying cars in that they’ll be quite noisy. The wind force generated will be very high. Let’s just say that if something’s flying over your head, if there are a whole bunch of flying cars all over the place, that is not an anxiety-reducing situation…You’re thinking, ‘Did they service their hubcap? Or is it going to come off and guillotine me as they’re flying past?'”
However, he’s never been against them. He has also said he’s in favor of both tunnels and flying cars.
Contrary to press reports, I’m not against flying cars. Just said it was important to consider both pros and cons.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 24, 2015
Most recently, Musk said that anyone who wants a flying car should be able to get one. This was stated last October on the Joe Rogan Experience:
“My friend Peter Thiel once reflected that the future was supposed to have flying cars, but we don’t have flying cars… I think if Peter wants a flying car, we should be able to buy one.”
Whether the Roadster will be Tesla’s flying car or potentially another one remains in the mind of Musk. Of course, the Roadster will have to make its way to production lines before we find out.
Elon Musk
SpaceX’s next trillion dollar bet has nothing to do with rockets, Musk tells staff
Elon Musk told SpaceX staff AI revenue will soon dwarf rockets and Starlink combined entirely.
Elon Musk told SpaceX employees this week that artificial intelligence, not rockets, will soon carry the company’s revenue. In a roughly 29 minute internal address posted on SpaceX’s X account on Tuesday, Musk said AI revenue will pass every other line of business at SpaceX “probably in September” and pull further ahead by the fourth quarter.
The numbers he gave are specific. SpaceX currently runs 1.4 gigawatts of AI compute capacity. Musk wants that at 10 gigawatts by the end of 2027, a jump he tied directly to revenue: “if we bring 10GW of AI online by the end of next year, it will be $300 billion to $500 billion a year in revenue.” He called those “big numbers,” which undersells a projection larger than what most countries produce in a year.
We made rockets reusable and are rebuilding the internet in space. The next challenge: making life multiplanetary and understanding the true nature of the universe
Watch @ElonMusk deliver a company update to @SpaceX employees pic.twitter.com/5c8rxoCQfu
— SpaceX (@SpaceX) August 11, 2026
Musk went further on where AI fits into SpaceX’s future. “Probably in four or five years, AI will be 99% of the value of SpaceX,” he told staff, adding that digital intelligence would eventually run “a trillion times” ahead of biological intelligence as computing scales. He tied that growth to the company’s founding mission, telling employees “we must win on AI, because the future is overwhelmingly AI and robots,” with the payoff meant to help fund Starship and a Mars program that increasingly runs through Terafab, the joint Tesla, SpaceX and xAI chip plant.
Elon Musk launches TERAFAB: The $25B Tesla-SpaceXAI chip factory that will rewire the AI industry
None of this is entirely new territory. SpaceX told investors much the same story during its first earnings call as a public company on August 4, where Musk moved the company’s $1 trillion revenue target up a year to 2030 and said Starlink could someday carry a majority of the world’s internet. What the all hands video adds is a hard deadline and a specific power figure Musk had not given publicly before, along with a franker pitch to his own workforce that AI, not launch cadence, is now the thing SpaceX is betting its future on.
The AI revenue itself is not coming from SpaceX training its own models. It is largely Starlink acting as the network layer for xAI’s workloads, plus SpaceX renting out compute capacity directly, the same approach behind the roughly $16 billion the company spent on AI infrastructure in a single quarter.
Musk closed the video with a pitch aimed at recruiting and retention rather than investors, telling employees that anyone who helps SpaceX win the AI race will eventually get the chance to go to the moon or Mars themselves. Whether SpaceX can turn 1.4 gigawatts into 10 in seventeen months is the more immediate question, and one that will show up in quarterly numbers well before anyone leaves Earth.
Tesla wins three-year standoff against Sweden’s IF Metall union
Tesla CEO Elon Musk says flying cars are coming
