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SpaceX shows off Starman helmet and Falcon Heavy to political VIPs
In the wake of the rather odd second meeting of the US National Space Council (NSC), a NASA photographer stationed at Kennedy Space Center documented a number of tours given by some of the companies mentioned in the proceedings. VIPs who attended the NSC were allowed to get up close and personal to rocket hardware in facilities owned and operated by SpaceX, Blue Origin, Boeing, the United Launch Alliance (ULA), and others, and in a few cases provided some unique views of those same facilities.
RELATED: SpaceX vs. Blue Origin: The bickering titans of new space
Humorously enough, those tours – at least as seen through the lenses of NASA photographer Kim Shiflett – acted as a generally accurate thematic representation of each company. ULA walked VIPs through their Delta IV Heavy integration facility, ready for the launch of a NASA spacecraft tasked with traveling closer to the sun than any vehicle before it – the impressive but oft-maligned rocket’s first launch in nearly two years.
Boeing displayed some of their Starliner hardware, hoped to carry their first crew to the International Space Station in very late 2018 or early 2019. Blue Origin showed off a massive factory – intended to eventually manufacture their orbital New Glenn rocket – that was, by all appearances, almost completely empty, aside from a flight-proven New Shepard and boilerplate capsule now on display in the lobby.
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- ULA president and CEO Tory Bruno, left leads a tour of the Delta IV Heavy rocket for VP Mike Pence. (NASA)
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- Boeing, one of the two companies that comprise ULA, gave NSC VIPs a tour of the facility where they are assembling Starliner crew capsules. (NASA)
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- Blue Origin’s seemingly empty New Glenn factory. The massive rocket is hoped to complete its first launch NET 2020. (NASA)
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- Blue Origin has had some success with its New Shepard suborbital rocket reuse program, although dramatically different from New Glenn. (NASA)
SpaceX, however, undertook the (admittedly less than titanic) feat of overshadowing its fellow aerospace companies. Something like 80% coincidence and 20% theatrics, SpaceX’s displays included two of the just-launched and just-landed Falcon Heavy boosters – one accessible by all at the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Center, the other recently shuttled into the company’s facilities at Pad 39A. While the company appears not to have opened their second LC-40 pad for tours this time around, Space Council VIPs were given a unique mass-tour of Pad 39A’s Horizontal Integration Facilities, chock full of flight-proven orbital rockets and components.
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- Titanium grid fins complete the highly reusable changes to Block 5 of Falcon 9. (NASA)
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- A unique perspective of SpaceX’s upgraded grid fin – dwarfing its human onlookers. (NASA)
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- Shotwell, pictured on the right, spoke in depth about SpaceX’s profitability and synergies with Tesla’s battery expertise. (NASA)
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- (NASA)
On display was the second Falcon Heavy side booster, a Falcon 9-equivalent first stage that took part in the inaugural launch of the massive rocket just two weeks before, as well as one of that booster’s highly valuable titanium grid fins, providing a unique sense of scale (spoiler: they’re colossal). Further, after what can only be described as Starman’s iconic global debut, SpaceX brought along the helmet of one of their slick internally-designed spacesuits, going so far as to let members of the tour – including the Secretary of the Air Force – briefly try it on for themselves.
.@NASA I’m ready to go. When’s the next launch? pic.twitter.com/XC21RFEw5C
— Office of the Secretary of the Air Force (@SecAFOfficial) February 21, 2018
Despite the baffling fact that none of the actual hardware developers that gave tours after had seats on either of the two panels that spoke before the Council, it’s great to see SpaceX flaunt at least a portion of its extraordinary and praiseworthy achievements in the last few months alone.
Whether or not you resent some of the politicking or the actors involved in the spectacle, the general theme of reducing and improving regulatory burdens on US aerospace companies is one of the very few places where there is actually some truth to the negativity. Jingoistic China-bashing and hyperbole aside, some of the panelists and councilmembers made reasonable points about the state of spaceflight regulation, and some of their recommendations may actually benefit companies like Blue Origin, ULA, and SpaceX – at least eventually.
Catch our live, behind-the-scenes coverage of these exciting events through the eyes of our amazing photographers on both coasts.
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Elon Musk
SpaceX Starship Flight 13 aborted at Zero and Musk just told us what broke
Four Raptor engines failed to ignite at T-zero, forcing SpaceX to scrub Starship Flight 13 Thursday.
SpaceX scrubbed the Starship Flight 13 launch attempt Thursday evening at the last possible moment, after four of the Super Heavy booster’s 33 Raptor 3 engines failed to ignite during the startup sequence. The 90-minute window had opened at 6:45 p.m. EDT from Starbase in Boca Chica, Texas, and the countdown had proceeded without issue all day, with more than 11.5 million pounds of liquid methane and liquid oxygen being fully loaded into the rocket before the automated abort triggered. SpaceX’s launch directors posted on X, “Standing down from today’s flight test attempt,” and shut down the livestream shortly after.
Musk confirmed the root cause within hours. “Some of the engines didn’t start, triggering an automatic launch abort,” he wrote on X. “To be confident of a good flight, 2 Raptors will be removed and replaced. Most probable launch timing is early next week.” SpaceX engineers began draining propellant tanks immediately and Booster 20 was rolled back to its hangar for inspection.
The timing adds a layer of significance that did not exist during any of the previous 12 Starship flights. This is the first time SpaceX has attempted to launch Starship since the company made its stock market debut in June, listing under ticker SPCX at $135 per share. Public investors are now watching every Starship outcome in real time, and a last-second abort carries more visibility than it would have six months ago.
Flight 13 was designed to be one of the most consequential tests in the program’s history. It was set to carry 20 Starlink V3 satellites, the first operational payload Starship has ever attempted to deploy. Six of those satellites carried external cameras to photograph Starship’s heat shield from the outside during flight, which would act as a self-inspection approach SpaceX has never attempted before. The mission also needed to complete a Raptor engine relight in space, a step SpaceX skipped on Flight 12 in May after losing an engine during ascent. That Flight 12 booster also flipped 90 degrees off course during its boostback burn when five engines failed to reignite.
SpaceX has not announced an official next launch date. Musk’s “early next week” window points to July 21 or 22 at the earliest, pending the engine swap and a return to the pad.
Elon Musk flew under the radar with his recent purchase of a $1 billion energy company, according to Federal Trade Commission (FTC) documents.
Transaction number 202612350 listed Tesla and SpaceX frontman Elon Musk as the acquiring party and CF APR Super Holdings LLC as the seller, with New APR Energy, LLC as the acquired entity. The deal, which closed without public announcement, came to light on May 14.
BREAKING: Elon Musk acquires Jacksonville power company APR Energy in a deal valued at more than $1,000,000,000.00.
— Polymarket Money (@PolymarketMoney) July 15, 2026
Analysts inferred the deal’s scale from minority stakeholder disclosures, including one report of a 5 percent interest sold for approximately $50.4 million. Fortress Investment Group had purchased APR’s assets in late 2024, rebranded the operation as New APR Energy, and subsequently transferred ownership to Musk.
APR Energy specializes in rapidly deployable power infrastructure. The company maintains one of the world’s largest fleets of mobile gas and diesel turbines, with more than 1.1 gigawatts of generation capacity. Its modular units, which are often trailer-mounted, enable turnkey installations ranging from 20 MW to over 500 MW.
APR provides full engineering, procurement, construction, operation, and maintenance services for behind-the-meter power plants, serving everything from data centers, utilities, and industrial clients.
The firm has expanded aggressively to meet surging demand, recently adding turbines and deploying over 100 MW for a major AI hyperscaler. Its solutions bridge critical gaps where grid interconnections face delays of two to five years, according to Yahoo.
The acquisition means something more for Musk. As he continues to expand projects in artificial intelligence, especially xAI, his AI venture, there is a greater need to supply energy-intensive supercomputing clusters, including the Colossus project, with what they need: reliable and high-capacity power.
Ownership of APR provides immediate access to flexible generation assets that can be deployed adjacent to data centers, reducing dependence on a strained infrastructure. It also complements Tesla’s energy storage business, so Musk will be able to pull from his own entities to address the rapid scaling demands of AI training and compute.
Tesla had a petition protesting a recall to fix a potential issue with 2017-2023 Model Y and Model 3 vehicles’ headlights was denied, as the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) disagreed with the company’s opinion of things.
The recall covers approximately 19,917 Model Y and Model 3 vehicles built from 2017 to 2023. Tesla initially submitted a noncompliance report for the headlights on these vehicles on March 15, 2024. Tesla then petitioned for an exemption from the fix, which violated FMVSS No. 108 (40 CFR 571.108), arguing that the “noncompliance is inconsequential as it relates to motor vehicle safety.
🚨 Tesla was denied a petition by the NHTSA to avoid a recall of 19,900 2017-2023 Model 3 and Model Y vehicles.
The NHTSA found that the vehicles’ headlights may exceed maximum lighting levels. Tesla argued it was inconsequential and did not require a recall. pic.twitter.com/m8Jmm1teLL
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) July 16, 2026
The NHTSA disagreed, stating that Tesla’s conclusion that the headlights do not increase any risk was not an opinion it shared. The agency said it disagreed with Tesla’s assumption that glare is not increased to surrounding traffic. This issue could be highlighted even more in certain weather conditions.
Tesla will be required to remedy the issue, the NHTSA ruled:
“In consideration of the foregoing, NHTSA has decided that Tesla has not met its burden of persuasion that the subject FMVSS No. 108 noncompliance is inconsequential to motor vehicle safety. Accordingly, Tesla’s petition is hereby denied, and Tesla is consequently obligated to provide notification of and free remedy for that noncompliance under 49 U.S.C. 30118 and 30120.”
The issue here appears to be the angle of the headlights and the brightness they emit during operation. The NHTSA report states that:
“Tesla’s headlamp supplier, Marelli Automotive Lighting, tested 25 right-hand and 25 left-hand lamps, and for this sample, found the maximum photometric intensity measured in the 10°U to 90°U and 90°L to 90°R zone was between 136.2 cd and 230.1 cd for the right-hand lamps and between 117.5 cd and 160.3 cd for the left-hand lamps. According to Tesla, these tests revealed that the photometric intensity of the right-hand and left-hand headlamp lower beam on the subject vehicles may measure as much as 230.1 cd in the 10°U to 90°U and 90°L to 90°R zone, exceeding the maximum photometric intensity by 105.1 cd. Additionally, Tesla states that a left-hand lamp tested by a Transport Canada recognized laboratory measured a maximum of 171.27 cd in the 10°U to 90°U and 90°L to 90°R zone. Despite these measurements exceeding the allowed photometric maximum of 125 cd, Tesla believes that the subject noncompliance is inconsequential to motor vehicle safety.”
Tesla also argued at some points that the headlights had not been deemed responsible for any complaints, accidents, or injuries related to the noncompliance.
SpaceX Starship Flight 13 aborted at Zero and Musk just told us what broke
Elon Musk secretly acquires $1B energy company to power the AI future
