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SpaceX lobbies NASA to foster competitive deep space exploration
Tim Hughes, the senior VP of SpaceX’s global business and government affairs, testified earlier this morning before the Senate Subcommittee on Space, Science, and Technology and the Committee on Commerce, Science, and Technology. He put forth a strong argument that it would be in the best interests of both NASA and the United States to encourage commercial competition in pursuit of the exploration of deep space, and that this could be done with concrete goals like improved interplanetary communications, vertically landing spacecraft on the Moon, and sending substantial amounts of cargo to Mars.
Before joining SpaceX, Hughes was the central actor responsible for drafting and supporting the Commercial Space Launch Amendments Act of 2004, which effectively paved the way for NASA’s first programs of commercial competition just two years later. He joined the company in 2005, and has defined SpaceX’s approach to legal and government affairs in the many years since.
Leveraging data related to the major successes and efficiency of NASA’s Commercial Orbital Transport Services (COTS) initiative, which began in earnest in 2006, Hughes demonstrated that by awarding SpaceX with funds from COTS, NASA ultimately found themselves with a highly-capable orbital launch vehicle after a relatively miniscule investment of $396 million into the venture. A study later conducted by NASA estimated that developing the same vehicle with a traditional NASA or commercial approach would have cost approximately $4 billion or $1.7 billion respectively, implying that the COTS approach was as much as ten times more efficient than NASA’s own traditional strategies of launch vehicle procurement.
SpaceX’s CRS-11 mission just over a month ago was the company’s 10th successful transport of cargo to the ISS. (SpaceX)
Of course, SpaceX themselves invested over $500 million initially following NASA’s COTS award, but NASA’s bode of confidence in the company likely made it possible in the first place for it to raise that level of funding. The point of this presented data, of course, is to segue into the argument that the introduction of commercial competition into the field of deep space exploration could also benefit NASA in the sense that it might be drastically more cost effective than current approaches. Hughes did not explicitly call out any current programs during his testimony, but the clear figureheads are the Space Launch System and Orion. Such a request from private industry also acts as a bit of a gentle suggestion to those in NASA, related Congressional and Senatorial committees. Subcommittees that past and current traditional strategies of hardware procurement for space exploration may be showing signs of age and obsolescence in the face of more efficient commercial ventures.
In fact, NASA’s Chief of Spaceflight, Bill Gerstenmaier, admitted earlier today in a very rare streak of candor that he “[couldn’t] put a date on humans on Mars” and that that was a result of a severe lack of budget to design and build the myriad technologies, hardware, and vehicles necessary to actually take advantage of a heavy launch vehicle like the Space Launch System. NASA is admittedly beginning to pursue and request industry information for what they are calling a Deep Space Gateway or NEXTSTEP, intended to be a small orbital base or space station located closer to the Moon than to Earth. A successfully-developed DSG would indeed become one completed facet of the architecture needed to bring humans to Mars, and can be compared in concept to SpaceX’s Big Falcon Spaceship in a limited fashion.
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- Boeing (pictured here), SNC, and five other companies all produced concepts that are now being evaluated by NASA for the NEXTSTEP program. (Boeing)
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- Sierra Nevada’s NEXTSTEP cislunar station concept. (SNC)
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- SpaceX’s conceptual Interplanetary Transport System from 2016 was considerably larger and more structurally complex than 2017’s BFR. (SpaceX)
Given Gestenmaier’s frank admittance that NASA’s budget is not presently able to support even a fraction of what is necessary for their “Journey to Mars”, exploring alternative methods of more efficiently exploiting the money NASA could realistically make available for further deep space exploration is almost certainly a major priority, or it at least ought to be. Gertsenmaier’s unspoken need for more efficient methods of exploring Mars and deep space would perfectly mesh with the requested program SpaceX’s Tim Hughes also presented earlier today, and the potential benefits SpaceX might also reap from such an arrangement make it worth serious consideration.
The political and corporate mire that NASA is almost innately intertwined with is the primary and most obvious barrier to the existence of a deep space COTS-esque program, but it is possible that some amount of calculated politicking on behalf of SpaceX could result in the right Senators or Representatives getting behind SpaceX’s mission of cost-effective space exploration.
The Tesla Model Y L is arguably the most hyped trim of the all-electric crossover, other than the Performance configuration that comes with white-knuckle speed and sports car-level handling.
However, it is not all perfect. Tesla owners in China who took delivery of the Model Y L, denoted with an L to highlight its longer wheelbase, are experiencing what they are referring to as “collapsing” of the rear wheels, as suspension issues appear to be an issue with some of the builds.
🚨 Model Y L owners in China report rear suspension sag
• Six-seat long-wheelbase Y. Shanghai. On sale since August 2025
• Owners say the rear tire-to-arch gap shrinks after mileage or a full load. Some cases after about 9,000 km loaded. Others near 30,000 km
• Tesla service… pic.twitter.com/Lr6i5Tbi07— Joe Hansen (@joehansen) September 1, 2026
The gap between the wheel arch and tire has narrowed to the point that “not even a single finger” could fit, according to a report from Car News China. The failures are not tied to a specific mileage, as one owner said that after just 9,000 kilometers (5,600 miles), they noticed the suspension issue when their car was fully loaded.
Another one had the issue at 30,000 kilometers (18,640 miles) and noticed that the wheel gap shrank to two fingers, so not as drastic as the person who reported a similar issue at 9,000 km.
Tesla Model Y L is gaining momentum in China’s premium segment
Along with the visual recognition of the issue, others are saying the sagging is causing abnormal wear on the inside of the tires. Extra weight and instant torque already provide additional stress on the tires in electric vehicles during normal operation, so it is no surprise that this is another complaint.
There has been no recall issued by Tesla, and the company has not yet publicly acknowledged the issue.
Some are suggesting that owners use a “finger test” to self-diagnose whether there is an issue with the suspension. There should be four fingers between the tire and the wheel well; anything less than that starts to get dicey.
Tesla is starting to truly tease and hype its groundbreaking Cybercab event, which takes place tomorrow in Austin, Texas. It will be the first time members of the public will be able to ride in a Cybercab, a vehicle without any manual controls, on public roads.
Tesla has been dropping some hype on X over the past several days, but this morning, the excitement has truly started to build up for the event. Although Cybercab has been unveiled before, this is truly Tesla’s announcement that it is ready to start offering autonomous rides for public passengers in its new ride-hailing-geared vehicle for the first time.
The hype has started with a variety of different social media posts that are a true indication that Tesla is preparing for something big. Teasing so much of the potential of Cybercab, including its ability to truly revolutionize how people hail rides for local travel, is what the big idea for the event entails. The time that many Tesla owners, fans, and investors have been waiting for is potentially here:
— Tesla (@Tesla) September 2, 2026
The event has remained slim on details. Even invitees are still awaiting true details about what the event will entail, where they’ll go, and what is in store for the evening. This is pretty typical for an event run by Tesla; they keep things under wraps for the most part until the very last minute.
However, there is no secret about what the real intention of Tesla is for this event: it is going to be a huge reveal party for a vehicle that has no steering wheel and no pedals. It is a truly massive step for the company moving forward.
No steering wheel, no pedals
— Tesla Robotaxi (@robotaxi) September 2, 2026
Speculation persists as to whether this is going to be an event that simply announces that rides will begin with the Cybercab, or it will be something more substantial. Tesla has said in the past that they plan to sell the Cybercab to the general public in what could become a great way to earn passive income by adding it to a more global fleet of Robotaxi-geared vehicles.
Tomorrow, the show begins in Austin, and the Cybercab goes live at some capacity; we just don’t know exactly how quite yet.
News
SpaceX tells the FCC that Starship Flight 14 is going to orbit
SpaceX filed with the FCC for Starship Flight 14, its first true orbital launch attempt.
SpaceX has asked the Federal Communications Commission for permission to fly Starlink terminals during Starship’s fourteenth flight test, and the filing lays out a genuine trip to orbit, something the program has never attempted.
Every Starship flight so far, including Flight 13’s successful splashdown in the Indian Ocean on July 24, has flown a suborbital arc that ends with the ship reentering the atmosphere within the same hour it launches. The FCC paperwork describes a mission profile built around an actual orbital insertion instead.
The payload is the other half of the story. Flight 13 carried 20 production Starlink V3 satellites, but because that mission never reached orbit, the satellites reentered along with the ship rather than joining the constellation, something Teslarati covered in detail after SpaceX released footage shot from one of those satellites as it drifted away from Starship in space. Flight 14 is designed to close that gap. If the orbital insertion holds, the roughly 20 V3 satellites onboard would separate into an operational orbit and could eventually go into service, each one rated for about 1 terabit per second of downlink capacity by SpaceX’s own account.
SpaceX announces new Starbase for ‘thousands of Starship launches annually’
Elon Musk first flagged the orbital attempt during SpaceX’s August 4 earnings call, the company’s first as a public entity following its June IPO under the ticker SPCX. He also floated catching the ship with the Starbase tower on the same flight, an idea he walked back on August 20, saying the catch attempt would more likely come “in a few months,” as Teslarati reported at the time. Flight 14 will instead target a splashdown for the ship in the Indian Ocean, the same recovery method used since Flight 12.
Hardware has been catching up to the ambition. Booster 21 completed a full 33-engine static fire on August 28, and Ship 41 finished its own six-engine test the week before. An airspace briefing circulated to pilots on August 20 listed September 15 as the target date, later than the end of August window Musk mentioned on the earnings call, though SpaceX has not confirmed a launch date publicly and Starship schedules routinely slip while hardware and FAA paperwork line up.
The FCC filing itself does not guarantee a launch date. It covers communications authority, and not flight readiness, considering SpaceX still needs Ship 41 fully stacked and cleared by the FAA before Flight 14 can fly. But the filing is a real marker of intent and it puts a specific regulatory process behind what had so far only been Musk’s word on the earnings call.
Tesla Model Y L gets suspension complaints in over odd issue China
Tesla Cybercab event gains steam ahead of massive launch
