Lifestyle
Rocket launch photographer covering SpaceX: “I have the coolest job in the world”
“You have the coolest job in the world!” is something I hear quite often. Not because I get to post selfies on Instagram, while standing on top of the roof of NASA’s Vehicle Assembly Building that once served as home to the Space Shuttle, but because I film rockets.
My name is Tom Cross and I’m a credentialed rocket launch photographer for Teslarati at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
Being mainly accustomed to story-telling through photographs, this blog will be a first for me, so bear with me as I attempt to bring you into my life and show you what it’s like to be involved in SpaceX launch operations as a press-photographer, in written word.
In addition, I’ve already begun posting little video snippets on Instagram, giving SpaceX fans insight on my launch preparations and a behind-the-scenes look at launch facilities. Another common question I get is: “What type of gear do you use?” For the techies out there, I’ll be answering these types of questions, while also providing tips on photography and editing.
I don’t expect this to be an overly technical type of blog and I’ll try to make it fun, nerdy, and quick to read. If you’re new to rockets or photography I think you’ll enjoy it because I haven’t gotten sucked into it so much to be exclusively interested in the esoteric things. Let’s make this an interactive experience so be sure to leave me a comment, ask questions, or tell me if I missed something you want to see!
It is a wonderful privilege to be able to turn a passion for photography and space exploration into a career, something that does not escape me one moment. I’m blessed to know that my wife and family are very supportive, as it takes quite an investment of time to do this type of work.
So, how did I get into this, you ask? Long story short: I used to watch Space Shuttle launches while growing up here in Florida. I was fascinated by them and wanted to know about the people who were handpicked to ride on the Shuttle, so I decided to learn more by reading the biographies of these astronauts. Most of them were inspiring and surprisingly entertaining. Astronauts have an incredible camaraderie and I find their sense of humor, derived from experiences only an astronaut would have, simply hilarious.
That wasn’t enough though.
Because I lived so close to where all of the action was taking place, I began to frequent Kennedy Space Center’s Visitor Center to experience and learn more about the industry. There, I had the opportunity to meet some of the astronauts that I’ve been reading about! What a blast (no pun intended) it was to be able to do that. It turns out, they’re no mythical space superhero. Rather, they’re interesting everyday people, too – believe it or not.
I believe great images allow people to experience something in an intimately deep visual language that only they can truly understand, and it’s a special moment for me when I pull up one of my pictures on my iPhone and hand it over to them and see the positive reaction on their face.
I took photography classes at a local college. During my time as a professional paintball player I saw a lot of incredible images of the sport so, when I stopped playing, I began to take my own photos from my perspective as a former pro-player. My photography began with paintball events, teams, and players. Then, it moved into Racing at Daytona International Speedway from inside the team pits and the infield. I got hooked on shooting extreme sports and not being the type of person who is content on just watching – I had to be involved! Now, my long-time passion for space and photographing remarkable-extremes lead to shooting rocket launches and there’s nothing more thrilling to me than this!
https://twitter.com/_TomCross_/status/950281149871542272
Have you ever been here for a rocket launch? Close enough to hear it? Feel it?
2018 is going to be a lively year for space. I’m sure many of you reading this have either considered coming to witness the demo-launch of SpaceX’s Falcon Heavy at the end of January, or already have plans for it. Either or, if you do come and see a guy speaking into a vlog camera and looking slightly overenthusiastic about it, chances are it’s going to be me, so come say hi.
Have a good one,

On a very cold & dark morning at LC-39A photographing Falcon 9. (Photo by: Thaddeus Cesari, Observer, @thaddeusces)
Lifestyle
Tesla Cybertruck targets job site crews with new Tailgate Utility Track and Bed Gear Box accessory
Tesla launched a $350 tailgate track and a $985 lockable Bed Gear Box for Cybertruck.
Tesla’s Cybertruck team added two more items to the Tesla Shop, targeting job site crews and owners who use the truck bed for actual work rather than just showing it off. The official Cybertruck X account posted the Tailgate Utility Track and the Bed Gear Box within minutes of each other, part of a five item batch that also included a reflective jacket, a spray paint hat and an updated reflective tee.
The Tailgate Utility Track runs $350 and turns the folded down tailgate into another mounting surface. It’s a single aluminum track with a T-slot for sliding accessories and two L-track attachment points, plus two load stops included in the box. The pitch is straightforward: strap down oversized cargo, like lumber or a cooler, that hangs off the back of the bed without it sliding out mid-drive. It bolts onto the existing tailgate and works on every Cybertruck trim.
Tailgate Utility Trackhttps://t.co/PCAYXlFBvS pic.twitter.com/sCV2NVxf1W
— Cybertruck (@cybertruck) September 3, 2026
The Bed Gear Box costs $985 and is a different kind of accessory. It’s a lockable aluminum storage box, 55.78 inches long, 19.8 inches wide and 7.79 inches tall, that mounts to the bed’s L-track rails and comes with two internal bins for smaller items. According to Tesla, at just over 57 pounds empty, it’s meant to stay in place rather than come in and out with each trip, giving owners a factory-fit alternative to loose totes for tools, recovery gear or emergency supplies. Tesla’s listing notes that Long Range and Dual Motor AWD Cybertrucks need the L-Tracks accessory installed separately before the Gear Box will mount, since L-tracks come standard only on certain configurations.
Both accessories lean on the idea Tesla has been building toward since Elon Musk first described the Cybertruck’s third-party attachment strategy at the 2023 shareholder meeting, when he said the truck would ship with mounting points so outside companies, and Tesla itself, could keep adding gear without redesigning the bed. That’s the same L-track backbone underneath the tailgate shield and jumpseats Tesla launched last year, and the off-road armor package that arrived through the same X account in 2025.
Owners looking to round out the rest of the L-track ecosystem, cargo dividers, MOLLE panels, bed racks and similar gear, can find a wider range of options through our Cybertruck accessories collection.
Elon Musk
Elon Musk says he knows how to save Earth for a billion years
Elon Musk says sentient AI satellites launched from the Moon could keep Earth livable forever.
Elon Musk spent part of his weekend describing a plan to keep the planet livable for roughly a billion years, and it starts with satellites that can think for themselves.
In a post on X, Musk argued that swapping fossil fuels for solar and wind power will not be enough to protect humanity from what he called extremely severe extinction events, the kind that occur roughly every 100 million years. His fix is what he called sentient satellites, or solar-powered satellites, controlled by AI, that would sit in a fixed spot between Earth and the Sun after being launched off the Moon using a giant electromagnetic catapult instead of rockets.
The satellites’ onboard AI would make continuous, small adjustments rather than waiting on human instructions. The mass driver is Musk’s proposed way of getting the raw material there cheaply by using an electromagnetic launch track built on the Moon, where lower gravity and no atmosphere make it far easier to fling cargo into space than it is from Earth.
But we do need to act much faster than that if people still want to live where the beach is today. We have about 50 years or so to take action, which should be more than enough time for the space satellites to solve any heating problems. https://t.co/xhrVQALwQw
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) August 30, 2026
Musk shared a Grok generated estimate suggesting roughly 5 percent of Florida’s land, or about 1.68 million acres, could face regular flooding by 2070 under a high sea level rise scenario, and said humanity has about 50 years to act before coastal living looks very different than it does today.
This is not the first time Musk has floated the idea. He raised a similar concept in November, describing a solar powered AI satellite constellation that could make tiny adjustments to incoming sunlight to fine tune Earth’s temperature. Musk has also tied planetary risk to his broader vision at SpaceX, where his compensation package is explicitly linked to establishing a self-sustaining Mars colony, one he has described as an insurance policy against the kind of extinction event he referenced this weekend, and where he has said humans could set foot within five to seven years.
Lifestyle
Police sergeant recounts his Neuralink journey with Elon Musk’s brain chip
A former Vancouver police sergeant with ALS accounts his journey to become a patient for Elon Musk’s Neuralink wireless brain-computer interface technology.
“I’m texting you from my brain right now.” That was the first message Lee Marten sent after waking up from Neuralink surgery, five hours and one migraine after dozens of threads were stitched into his motor cortex.
Marten, a former Vancouver police sergeant, is one of the first Canadian ALS patients to receive Neuralink’s N1 brain implant, and the 26th recipient overall. He tells his story in a first-person account published by Maclean’s.
Marten recounts how he was a healthy, athletic Vancouver police sergeant until April 2022 when symptoms of muscle twitching and balance loss, were followed by a bad fall that broke his leg. He would eventually be diagnosed with ALS in early 2025 at the age of 47. ALS, also known as Lou Gehrig’s disease, is a fatal neurodegenerative disease that progressively destroys the motor neurons controlling voluntary muscle movement, eventually taking away a patient’s ability to walk, speak, swallow and breathe. There’s no cure, and most patients live two to five years after diagnosis.
He describes the devastation of the diagnosis and how he began preparing for it while connecting with other young ALS patients through a WhatsApp group called Young Guns. Through that group he learned about a Neuralink clinical trial at Toronto Western Hospital and, after a roughly seven-month vetting process (physical assessments, psychiatric evaluation, a final interview with the Neuralink team), was accepted this past April as the trial’s 26th recipient and the first Canadian ALS patient to get the N1 implant. He recounts the May surgery in detail, including the robotic system that stitched 64 threads into his brain, and describes the app, Link, translating his neural signals into cursor control, which he was using within hours of waking up.
Marten walks through what daily use looks like, including weekly “brain training” exercises, a real-time neural-activity display, charging the implant via a beanie-mounted MagSafe charger, and using the implant for emailing, texting, social media, and gaming via a “Magic Box” that connects it to other devices. He also gives brief context on brain-computer interface history and quite candid about Musk, calling him “divisive” but saying he found him “easy to admire.
The piece closes on a heavier note, with Marten seeking to pursue medical assistance in dying as his symptoms progressed, noting that he’ll be able to communicate his final words to his family through Neuralink rather than facing a silent decline. He expresses hope the data from his case will help future ALS patients, even without a cure in his own lifetime.

