News
SpaceX looks to launch space tourists to record heights
SpaceX has signed an agreement with a space tourism company that could see its Crew Dragon spacecraft take space tourists to heights unmatched by astronauts in half a century.
On Tuesday, February 18th, Space Adventures announced the agreement, revealing that it is now officially looking for wealthy private customers interested in launching to orbit on a SpaceX rocket and spacecraft. Known as Crew Dragon, that spacecraft is perhaps just two or three months away from SpaceX’s inaugural astronaut launch, in which two NASA astronauts will be sent into orbit to rendezvous and dock with the International Space Station (ISS) before returning to Earth after several weeks or months in space.
Founded in 1998, while Space Adventures has a slightly checkered past and has been more or less inactive for more than a decade, the company did manage to arrange eight separate spaceflights for seven private customers between 2001 and 2009. All flights previously arranged were done so through Russian space agency Roscosmos with Soyuz rockets and spacecraft and involved approximately week-long visits to the International Space Station (ISS), where the private astronauts – all multimillionaires and billionaires – mainly observed routine ISS operations and assisted with science experiments. With SpaceX’s Falcon 9 and Crew Dragon, Space Adventures hopes to soon offer orbital tourists an option that keeps all operations in the United States.
As noted, it must be stated that the February 18th agreement doesn’t actually mean that private customers will definitively launch into orbit in SpaceX’s Crew Dragon spacecraft. Instead, it serves as a semi-contractual confirmation that the spaceflight company is officially willing and ready to support such a mission in the event that Space Adventures is able to secure enough customers to purchase the necessary launch services. While not out of the question, that will be no easy feat.
Thankfully, several aspects of this new agreement should work in SpaceX and Space Adventures’ favor. As a unique ‘free-flying’ mission, Crew Dragon and its space tourists would not actually rendezvous with the ISS – instead serving as its own miniature outpost in Low Earth Orbit (LEO) for several days. Relative to SA’s past tourist flights to the ISS, this will save a large portion of the time and cost associated with both training civilians for spaceflight and ISS operations and working with NASA and Roscosmos to arrange the complex mission.
Aside from simplifying the training and bureaucracy involved in orbital tourism, the fact that Space Adventures’ newest proposal will have no affiliation or involvement with NASA or Roscosmos also means that there’s nothing preventing SpaceX from using a flight-proven Falcon 9 booster and Crew Dragon capsule on its space tourist launch. By combining flight-proven hardware with a space station-free mission profile, SpaceX could theoretically cut the overall flight’s cost by tens or even hundreds of millions of dollars.
According to public analyses performed over the last few years by auditors and researchers, SpaceX Crew Dragon launches will likely cost NASA around $400 million each, while a comparable Boeing Starliner mission will cost the space agency at least $650 million. The SpaceX figure is, however, predicated upon the production of a brand new Falcon 9 rocket and Crew Dragon spacecraft for each launch and includes costs associated with any processing or operations involving NASA teams and facilities.
As noted above, the use of a thoroughly flight-proven Falcon 9 booster and Crew Dragon capsule could dramatically cut the cost of private astronaut launches relative to the NASA baseline. It’s conceivable that – having effectively amortized the cost of the spacecraft and booster with a NASA astronaut launch – such a private mission’s price could be little more than the cost of building a new Falcon upper stage and Crew Dragon trunk, as well as booster/capsule refurbishment and general operations. Conservatively, the ultimate price SpaceX offers or offered Space Adventures could thus be as low as $100-200 million per launch.
Space Adventures says it could support as many as four space tourists on one flight, translating to a cost of $25-50 million per person if all seats are filled. This would compare reasonably well with the $20-50 million it typically charged its seven orbital tourism customers. That is still a vast sum of money and cuts the pool of potential customers to perhaps a few tens of thousands of people worldwide. Nevertheless, Google co-founder Sergey Brin (and possibly others) is on a sort of waiting list (requiring a $5 million deposit) for future orbital Space Adventures flights, giving the company at least one strong prospective customer.
Thanks to skipping a space station rendezvous, perhaps the single biggest selling point of the mission is that Falcon 9 and Crew Dragon could potentially send space tourists higher than ever before – to an altitude only certain NASA Apollo and Gemini astronauts can claim to have surpassed. Space Adventures specifically notes this on its website, stating that prospective space tourists could reach an altitude that only Gemini 11 astronauts have surpassed while remaining in Earth orbit.
Gemini 11 astronauts reached an of apogee around 850 miles (1350 km) while still in Earth orbit – a record that stands today. Neither Space Adventures or SpaceX have specifically stated how high an unmodified Falcon 9 and Crew Dragon to launch private astronauts, but the implication is that the view would be comparable to – or even better than – what the Gemini 11 crew saw back in 1966. Regardless, it’s safe to say that if SpaceX and Space Adventures’ new space tourism effort is greeted with healthy demand, we’ll be shortly entering a new era of private spaceflight. Crew Dragon’s first private astronaut mission is tentatively scheduled to launch as early as late-2021 or early-2022.
Check out Teslarati’s Marketplace! We offer Tesla accessories, including for the Tesla Cybertruck and Tesla Model 3.
News
Tesla flexes its most impressive and longest Full Self-Driving demo yet
Tesla is flexing a lengthy Full Self-Driving demo from San Francisco to Los Angeles.
Tesla its most impressive and longest demo of the Full Self-Driving suite, showing a zero-intervention trek from the San Francisco Bay Area to Los Angeles. The drive required no interventions from the vehicle operator, the video showed.
It also included a quick Supercharging stop about two-thirds of the way in.
Tesla has been extremely confident in the performance of the FSD suite since releasing it years ago. However, with improvements in data comprehension and storage with its neural nets, as well as a more refined Hardware system, FSD has made significant strides over the last year.
I took a Tesla Model Y weekend-long Demo Drive – Here’s what I learned
Tesla’s prowess with driving tech has established the company as one of the industry leaders.
In a new video released on Tuesday, Tesla showed a drive of roughly 360 miles from San Francisco to Los Angeles, a trek of about six-and-a-half hours, with zero interventions using Full Self-Driving:
7 hour road trips aren’t so bad when your Tesla does all the driving pic.twitter.com/tIrmhDAbRf
— Tesla (@Tesla) August 12, 2025
Full Self-Driving is not fully autonomous, but it does operate under what Tesla calls “Supervised” conditions. This means that the driver does not have to have their hands on the wheel, nor do they have to control the accelerator or brake.
Instead, Tesla’s internal cabin-facing camera tracks eye movement to ensure the driver is ready to take over at any time and is paying attention.
The version of FSD used in this example is likely the version that the public has access to; the only differentiating factor would be the Hardware version, as older vehicles do not have HW4.
With Tesla’s Robotaxi suite in Austin operating since late June, the company stated that those vehicles are using a version that is not yet available to the public. It does not require anyone to be in the driver’s seat, which is how the vehicles are able to operate without anyone in the driver’s seat.
Elon Musk
Elon Musk’s new $29B Tesla stock award gets strange synopsis from governance firm
Did CGI not realize that Tesla Shareholders supported Musk being paid not once, but twice?
Elon Musk was recently awarded around $29 billion in Tesla stock as the company’s Board of Directors is attempting to get its CEO paid after his original pay package was denied twice by the Delaware Chancery Court.
But a new and strange synopsis from the Corporate Governance Institute (CGI) says the award is potentially a strength move to “endorse the will of a powerful CEO.” The problem is, in the same sentence, the firm said the new award brings up a “question of whether the board exists to steward a company in the interests of all stakeholders.”
The problem with their new analysis of Musk’s pay package is that shareholders voted twice on Musk’s original pay package of $56 billion. They voted to give Musk that sum on two separate occasions.
Musk’s original $56 billion pay package was approved by shareholders twice; once in 2018 and once again last year. Last year’s vote was in response to Delaware Chancery Court Kathaleen McCormick’s decision to revoke the “unfathomable sum” from Musk.
Shareholders still showed support for Musk getting paid. Tesla said in its new award to the CEO that this is a way to give him compensation for the first time in seven years.
CGI said in its note (via TipRanks):
“When a board builds its strategy around a single individual, it creates a concentration risk, not just operationally, but culturally and ethically. If that individual becomes a source of volatility, the company becomes fragile by design.”
What’s strange with this type of narrative is the fact that Tesla’s valuation has skyrocketed with Musk at the helm. Go back to 2020, and the stock is up over 200 percent. Since Musk’s $56 billion pay package was introduced in 2018, shares are up well over 1,000 percent.
Tesla engineer explains why Elon Musk deserves new pay package
Musk’s 2018 pay package was also not awarded to him without performance-based incentives. He was required to reach certain growth goals, all of which were accomplished through the launch of new vehicles and the advancements of its driver-assistance suites, like Autopilot and Full Self-Driving.
It is tough to agree with CGI’s perception of Musk’s new pay plan, especially as it is much less than what shareholders voted on twice. Musk deserves to be paid for his contributions to Tesla.
News
Tesla Robotaxi is headed to New York City, but one thing is in its way
Tesla is working to hire Vehicle Operators in New York City, but the company still needs some regulatory hurdles to go through.
Tesla Robotaxi will be headed to New York City, but there is one huge thing that stands in its way: approval to test autonomous vehicles.
Tesla is expanding its Robotaxi platform across the United States as it currently operates in Austin, Texas, and the Bay Area of California.
The company has also been seeking approvals in several other states, including Nevada, Arizona, and Florida.
However, the company is also working to expand to major metropolitan areas across the U.S. that it has not explicitly mentioned, as it attempts to reach CEO Elon Musk’s goal of giving half of the country’s population access to the platform by the end of the year:
🚨Tesla plans to offer driverless Robotaxi rides to half the U.S. population by the end of the year, Musk says https://t.co/xEDoTF6fIt
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) July 23, 2025
It appears New York City is next on the list, according to a job posting on Tesla’s Careers website.
The company says it is hiring a Vehicle Operator for Autopilot in Flushing, New York, a section of the borough of Queens. Queens is connected to Brooklyn and Long Island, so it seems more ideal than launching in Manhattan or the Bronx, where traffic is heavy and charging is not as readily available.
Tesla’s job posting states:
“We are looking for a highly motivated self-starter to join our vehicle data collection team. As a Prototype Vehicle Operator, you will be responsible for driving an engineering vehicle for extended periods, conducting dynamic audio and camera data collection for testing and training purposes. Access to the data collected is limited to the applicable development team. This role requires a high level of flexibility, strong attention to detail, excellent driving skills, and the ability to thrive in a fast-paced, dynamic environment.”
It also lists the hours of operation as Tuesday through Saturday or Sunday through Thursday, with its three shifts listed as:
- Day Shift: 6:00 AM – 2:30 PM or 8:00 AM – 4:30 PM
- Afternoon Shift: 2:00 PM – 10:30 PM or 4:00 PM – 12:30 AM
- Night Shift: 10:00 PM-6:30 AM or 12:00 AM-8:30 AM
We wouldn’t count on New York City being the next place Tesla launches Robotaxi. According to a report from CNBC, a spokesperson for the NYC Department of Transportation confirmed Tesla has not yet applied for permits that are needed to operate its ride-hailing service.
For what it’s worth, it could just be the first step in Tesla’s plans. It also has Vehicle Operator job postings in other regions. Houston, Texas, as well as Tampa, Miami, and Clermont, Florida, are all listed on Tesla’s Career postings.
Tesla flexes its most impressive and longest Full Self-Driving demo yet
Elon Musk’s new $29B Tesla stock award gets strange synopsis from governance firm
Tesla Robotaxi is headed to New York City, but one thing is in its way
-
Elon Musk6 days agoElon Musk teases crazy new Tesla FSD model: here’s when it’s coming
-
Elon Musk4 days agoElon Musk confirms Tesla AI6 chip is Project Dojo’s successor
-
News4 days agoTesla Model Y L reportedly entered mass production in Giga Shanghai
-
Elon Musk4 days agoTesla CEO Elon Musk details massive FSD update set for September release
-
News2 weeks ago
Elon Musk highlights Tesla Model Y’s most underrated feature
-
News2 weeks agoTesla takes first step in sunsetting Model S and X with drastic move
-
Cybertruck4 days agoTesla’s new upgrade makes the Cybertruck extra-terrestrial
-
Lifestyle2 weeks agoTesla brings perhaps the coolest interior feature to cars in latest update