Connect with us

News

SpaceX ships another huge propellant tank to South Texas BFR test site

SpaceX's Boca Chica facilities now sport two massive propellant tanks, meant to support BFR spaceship hop tests. (NSF /u/ bocachicagal, SpaceX)

Published

on

Captured by NASASpaceflight.com forum user “bocachicagal”, the second of several massive liquid methane tanks has arrived at SpaceX’s prospective Boca Chica, Texas facilities, to be dedicated to integrated testing of BFR’s spaceship/upper stage.

If there was any doubt beforehand, the arrival of a second ~100,000 gallon vacuum-insulated tank all but guarantees that SpaceX is planning a major campaign of BFR spaceship testing in South Texas – with as much as 200,000 gallons of storage capacity in those two tanks alone, SpaceX could easily top off two Falcon 9’s with liquid oxygen and still have more than 100 tons left over.

SpaceX’s second ~100,000 gallon tank now sits beside a similar copy – pictured here – that arrived in Texas earlier this summer. (Nehkara)

Per NASASpaceflight.com’s forums, it appears that this newest tank arrived at the site sometime yesterday or the day before. Thanks to the fundamental properties of BFR’s planned liquid methane and oxygen fuel and oxidizer, aspects of basic ground support infrastructure may actually be a significant improvement over Falcon 9’s refined kerosene (RP-1) and liquid oxygen, and dramatically superior (at least in a logistical and practical sense) to hydrogen/oxygen, a popular choice for many rockets.

In terms of volume and density, oxygen is about 2.5x denser than methane but optimally combusts at a ratio of roughly 3.5 parts oxygen to 1 part methane (3.5:1), with SpaceX likely to operate the Raptor engine closer to 3.8:1. This means that – despite their major density differences – BFR’s oxygen and methane tanks will ultimately end up very similarly sized to hold ~230t of liquid methane and ~860t of liquid oxygen (2017 BFR numbers).

Testing giant rockets: it’s not easy

As it relates to SpaceX’s South Texas propellant infrastructure, this likely means that a minimum of four large vacuum-insulated tanks will be needed to fully fuel a BFR spaceship (BFS), two for oxygen (~800t) and two for methane (~300t). Depending on how SpaceX has structured its BFR infrastructure acquisitions, the two large tanks now present in Boca Chica could be more than enough to support a wide range of spaceship hop tests. A full load of fuel is almost certainly unnecessary – if not outright implausible – for BFS hop testing: with a full load of ~1100t of fuel and the spaceship’s total mass around ~1250t, all seven planned Raptor engines would need to be installed and operating near full thrust (~1400t, 14,000 kN) to lift the ship off the ground.

Advertisement

 

For context, Falcon 9’s first stage produces a maximum thrust of roughly 7,600 kN at liftoff, while Falcon Heavy triples that figure to ~22,800 kN.  The spaceship/upper stage of BFR alone thus produces nearly two times as much thrust as an entire Falcon 9 at full throttle and as much as fourteen times as much thrust as Falcon 9 and Heavy’s upper stage, statistics that properly illustrate just how extraordinarily powerful BFR is when compared with the rockets SpaceX currently operates. BFR’s booster (BFB) is even wilder, featuring ~3.5 times as many Raptors and thus ~3.5 times as much thrust as the spaceship/upper stage.

As a result of the sheer power of just the spaceship alone, SpaceX may have to move directly to a style of launch pad closer to that used by Falcon 9 and Heavy rather than the spartan concrete slab used for Falcon 9’s Grasshopper testing. In this case, the rocket would be mounted some distance from the ground to minimize acoustic loads on the vehicle’s after and would likely include a water deluge system to further deaden thermal and acoustic energy while also minimizing damage to the concrete and metal structures that launch and landing pads are built out of.

 

Advertisement

Above all else, the presence of not one but two huge ~100,000-gallon vacuum-insulated tanks at SpaceX’s Boca Chica facilities all but guarantees that the company intends to situate a serious campaign of BFR tests there, likely including the integrated spaceship hop tests both Elon Musk and Gwynne Shotwell have explicitly mentioned in recent months. Put simply, SpaceX has no other reason to be bringing massive cryogenic propellant tanks to South Texas – the company has plenty of space at any one of its three large launch complexes (not to mention McGregor) if it wanted to store those tanks elsewhere, and those three facilities already have operational propellant storage and loading infrastructure for Falcon 9 and Heavy launches.

If more massive tanks continue to arrive or if it becomes clear that the two similar tanks present or solely meant for LOX or methane, the scale of SpaceX’s intentions in South Texas will become increasingly clearer.


For prompt updates, on-the-ground perspectives, and unique glimpses of SpaceX’s rocket recovery fleet check out our brand new LaunchPad and LandingZone newsletters!

Advertisement

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.

Advertisement
Comments

Cybertruck

Tesla Cybertruck gets long-awaited safety feature

Tesla has announced the rollout of its innovative anti-dooring protection feature to the Cybertruck via the 2026.8 software update.

Published

on

Credit: Tesla Asia | X

Tesla is rolling out a new and long-awaited feature to the Cybertruck all-electric pickup, and it is a safety addition geared toward pedestrian and cyclist safety, as well as accidents with other vehicles.

Tesla has announced the rollout of its innovative anti-dooring protection feature to the Cybertruck via the 2026.8 software update.

This safety enhancement uses the vehicle’s existing cameras to detect approaching cyclists, pedestrians, or vehicles in the blind spot while parked. Upon attempting to open a door, if a hazard is detected, the system activates: the blind spot indicator light flashes, an audible chime sounds, and the door will not open on the initial button press.

Drivers must wait briefly and press the button again to override, providing crucial seconds to avoid an accident.

Advertisement

The feature, also known as Blind Spot Warning While Parked, comes standard on every new Model 3 and Model Y, and is now extending to the Cybertruck. Leveraging Tesla’s vision-based system without requiring new hardware, it represents a cost-effective software solution that builds on community suggestions dating back to 2018.

Advertisement

This technology addresses the persistent danger of “dooring,” where a driver opens a car door into the path of a passing cyclist or pedestrian.

Tesla implemented this little-known feature to make its cars even safer

Dooring incidents are alarmingly common in urban environments.

According to Chicago data, in 2011 alone, there were 344 reported dooring crashes, accounting for approximately 20 percent of all bicycle crashes in the city, nearly one incident per day.

Advertisement

While numbers have fluctuated (dropping to 11 percent in 2014 before rising again), dooring consistently represents 10-20 percent of bike-related crashes in major cities.

A national analysis of emergency department data estimates over 17,000 dooring-related injuries treated in the U.S. over a decade, with many involving fractures, contusions, and head trauma, particularly affecting upper extremities.

By automatically intervening, Tesla’s system not only protects vulnerable road users but also safeguards its owners from potential liability and enhances overall road safety.

As cities promote cycling for sustainable transport, features like this demonstrate how advanced driver assistance and camera systems can evolve beyond highway driving to everyday urban scenarios.

Advertisement

Enthusiastic responses on social media highlight appreciation for the proactive safety measure, with some calling for broader rollout to older models where hardware permits. Tesla continues to push the boundaries of vehicle safety through over-the-air updates, making its fleet smarter and safer over time.

Continue Reading

Elon Musk

Tesla Roadster is ‘sorcery and magic’ and might be worth the wait, Uber founder says

Perhaps the wait will be worth it, especially according to Uber founder Travis Kalanick, who recently teased the Roadster’s potential capabilities based on what he has heard from internal Tesla sources.

Published

on

tesla roadster
Credit: Praveen Joseph/Twitter

Tesla is planning to unveil the Roadster in late April after years of waiting. But the wait might be worth it, according to Travis Kalanick, the founder of Uber, who recently shed some light on his expectations for the all-electric supercar.

We all know the Roadster is supposed to have some serious capability. CEO Elon Musk has said on numerous occasions that the Roadster will be unlike anything else ever produced. It might go from 0-60 MPH in about a second, it might hover, it might have SpaceX cold gas thrusters.

However, the constant delays in the Roadster program and its unveiling event continue to send Tesla fans into confusion because they’re just not sure when, or if, they’ll ever see the finished product.

Perhaps the wait will be worth it, especially according to Uber founder Travis Kalanick, who recently teased the Roadster’s potential capabilities based on what he has heard from internal Tesla sources.

Advertisement

Kalanick said on X:

Musk has said this vehicle is not going to be geared for safety, and that, “If safety is your number one goal, do not buy the Roadster.”

Advertisement

There has been so much hype regarding the Roadster that it is hard to believe the company could not come through on some kind of crazy features for the vehicle.

Elon Musk just dropped a huge detail on the Tesla Roadster

However, the latest delay that Tesla put on the unveiling event is definitely eye-opening, especially considering it is the latest in a series of pushbacks the company has put on the vehicle for the past several years.

Tesla has made several jumps in the Roadster project over the past few months, as it has ramped up hiring for the vehicle and also applied for a patent for a new seat design.

Advertisement

The car has been a back-burner project for Tesla, as it has been focusing primarily on autonomy and the rollout of Robotaxi and Cybercab. Additionally, its other vehicle projects, like the Model 3 and Model Y refreshes, took precedence.

Tesla still plans to unveil the Roadster next month, so we can hope the company can stick to this timeframe.

Continue Reading

Cybertruck

Elon Musk clarifies viral Tesla Cybertruck accident with driver logs

Musk has come out to say that the driver logs have already shown that the driver “disengaged Autopilot four seconds before crashing,” in a post on X.

Published

on

Credit: Fox Business | Hilliard Law Firm

Tesla CEO Elon Musk has clarified some details regarding the viral Tesla Cybertruck accident with company driver logs, which show various metrics at the time of an incident.

The logs have been used in the past to pull responsibility off of Tesla when the automaker’s Full Self-Driving (Supervised) or Autopilot platforms are blamed for a collision or accident. It appears this will be no different.

On Tuesday, a video of a Cybertruck crashing into an overpass barrier in August 2025 was shared by Fox Business in a story that reported a woman was suing the automaker for $1 million in a liability and negligence case.

In the suit, Justine Saint Amour said that, “Something terrifying happened, without warning, the vehicle attempted to drive straight off an overpass.” Her attorney, Bob Hilliard, said Amour “tried to take control, but crashed into the barrier and was seriously injured (mostly her shoulder, neck, and back).”

Advertisement

The Tesla Model Y is leading China’s electric SUV segment by a wide margin

Tesla vehicle crashes are widely popular to report by mainstream media outlets because of the sensationalism of the event. Oftentimes, these outlets will include Tesla in the headline, especially because it will pique the interest of the masses, as most who read the story are waiting to see the claim that Autopilot or Full Self-Driving was the culprit of the accident.

However, Tesla has access to the logs of every vehicle in its fleet, which will show the various metrics, like whether either FSD or Autopilot was active, if the accelerator was pressed, the speed, and other important factors.

Musk has come out to say that the driver logs have already shown that the driver “disengaged Autopilot four seconds before crashing,” in a post on X.

Advertisement

If the logs do show this, which Tesla will likely have to prove in court, the real question would be why did the Amour disengage the suite?

Tesla’s Full Self-Driving suite is still not fully autonomous, meaning the driver cannot pull attention away from the road and must be ready to take over the vehicle at all times.

Advertisement

It will be interesting to see how this particular case pans out, especially considering the clip that was released by the law firm starts at about four seconds before the collision. Tesla logs have dispelled media reports in the past that have accused the company’s suite of being responsible for an accident, so there will be some major attention on what is proven in this particular case.

Continue Reading