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SpaceX’s West Coast drone ship begins Panama Canal transit on journey to Florida (or Texas)
After traveling more than 3500 miles (5600 km), SpaceX autonomous spaceport drone ship (ASDS) Just Read The Instructions (JRTI) began its eastbound transit of the Panama Canal on August 18th, placing the vessel roughly two-thirds of the way to its unknown destination.
As previously discussed on Teslarati, JRTI’s move came as a bit of a surprise and it’s still anyone’s bet if the SpaceX recovery vessel heads for Texas or Florida immediately after exiting the Panama Canal. Nevertheless, JRTI’s presence at either (or, more likely, both) possible destinations arguably centers around the imminent demands of a planned ramp of SpaceX’s Starlink satellite constellation launch cadence, as well as an equally imminent need for recovery assets to support the first suborbital Starship test flights.
On July 31st, JRTI departed Port of Los Angeles – its home for the last four years – under tow behind tugboat Alice C. The duo arrived at the Canal on August 15th and, after a several-day wait in a large passage queue, the drone ship and its paired tugboat are finally on their way through the canal, although traffic still remains high and another day (or several) of waiting is likely in order.
After successfully making it through the first half of the transit, JRTI and Alice C are currently waiting in line while westbound traffic is routed through. That wait will likely last hours, not days, (hopefully) allowing JRTI to exit the canal on Tuesday or Wednesday, leaving drone ship free to head towards its final destination.
JRTI has two possible destinations: Port of Brownsville, Texas or Port Canaveral, Florida. Both options are roughly 1800 mi (3000 km) from the Panama Canal’s western mouth and, extrapolating from the first major leg of the journey, should take Alice C around 8 days to tow JRTI across the finish line. Barring mishaps, the drone ship should thus be able to arrive at its new home sometime in the final week of August – roughly August 27th to the 31st.
To the East, to the Gulf
As previously discussed on Teslarati, there are good cases to make for both potential drone ship destinations. On the East Coast, SpaceX’s plans to ramp up its internal Starlink launch cadence could require multiple drone ship to prevent those ambitions from seriously impacting the company’s commercial launch manifest. The readiness of one or two of the payloads is uncertain, but SpaceX has anywhere from seven to nine Falcon 9 launches scheduled in Q4 2019, requiring a cadence significantly higher than SpaceX’s activity in the first half of 2019.
At the same time, extrapolating from SpaceX’s H1 2019 cadence (1.33 launches per month), more than doubling that average cadence to 3 launches per month in the final quarter seems ambitious, at a minimum. SpaceX has achieved six-launch quarters several times in the last few years, likely a reasonable expectation for Q4 2019. In short, this is all to say that SpaceX has made do with one drone ship in the past while hitting similar launch cadences, meaning that the need for JRTI at Port Canaveral is probably not urgent.
On the Gulf Coast, SpaceX has established a Starship development facility in Boca Chica, Texas, just a handful of miles north of the southernmost tip of Texas. A full-scale, low-fidelity prototype known as Starhopper completed its first test flight on July 25th and is likely just days away from a second test flight. Meanwhile, SpaceX Boca Chica is simultaneously assembling what CEO Elon Musk has described as the “Mk1” orbital Starship prototype and is making spectacularly rapid progress.
Musk recently tweeted that SpaceX’s Mk1 Starship and a second parallel build – Starship Mk2 – could be ready for their first (suborbital) flights as early as late-September or October, followed by one of the spacecraft’s first orbital launch attempt an incredibly ambitious “2-3 months after” the first test flight. Per additional statements from Musk in 2018 and 2019, SpaceX plans to subject either or both of its Mk1 and Mk1 Starships to a high-altitude, high-velocity test program before proceeding to orbital launch attempts.
Said extreme testing could easily involve Starship traveling on high suborbital trajectories dozens or even hundreds of miles above Earth’s surface, potentially demanding an ocean-going landing platform far downrange. Given that Starship is in its very early stages of integrated development, any downrange assets (i.e. JRTI) needed for test flights will need to be very flexible, as Starship launch attempts could easily slip days or weeks with little to no notice.
Best of both worlds
Although pitting options against each other is entertaining and has its uses, the fact remains that once drone ship JRTI has passed through the Panama Canal, traveling from, say, Florida to Texas or vice versa is far less arduous a journey than the trip from Port of LA. In other words, moving JRTI between Port of Brownsville and Port Canaveral every few months should be very little trouble, easily allowing the drone ship to service both Gulf and East Coast recovery needs.
Given that SpaceX’s next Falcon 9 launch is believed to be no earlier than late-October, it’s not even out of the question that JRTI will stop in Brownsville for one month or several before heading to Port Canaveral as SpaceX attempts to complete a very busy Q4 2019 launch manifest. Stay tuned…
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SpaceX officially launched the Starlink Mini 2 on November 10, delivering the first portable Starlink terminal designed around independent power.
Invitation-only preorders for select U.S. customers are priced at $999 plus tax, a figure that includes a full year of Roam Unlimited service valued at roughly $2,100. A refundable $100 deposit reserves the kit, with the balance due at shipment, expected to begin in mid-December. Broader availability is listed as coming soon.
Starlink just unveiled Mini 2, its next-gen portable dish.
Quick-swap battery, up to 4.5 hrs per charge
USB-C power
Built-in Wi-Fi
Online in about 60 secondsPreorders are open now. https://t.co/QawqgbswrQ
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) November 10, 2026
The headline feature is the quick-swap 71 Wh battery. Clipped to the rear of the dish without tools, it delivers up to 4.5 hours of connectivity on a single charge.
The 490-gram pack includes its own USB-C port and LED indicators, so users can charge a spare separately and swap it in seconds while staying online. Starlink notes that the terminal can continue operating while the battery charges or run directly from a 60 W USB-C source. The retail box includes one battery, a 60 W USB-C charger, and a 3-meter cable.
Beyond power, the Mini 2 is thinner at 23.1 mm (versus 38.5 mm on the original Mini) while measuring 263 × 314 mm. With the battery and kickstand attached it weighs 1.6 kg.
Built-in Wi-Fi 6 expands coverage to up to 1,800 square feet, an IP67 rating protects against dust and water, and a standard 1/4-20 tripod thread plus physical power button round out the design. Field of view remains 110 degrees, and the unit retains support for mobile use.
For travelers, campers, and remote workers, the swappable battery removes the longstanding requirement for an external power bank or vehicle outlet that defined the first Mini. Spare packs sold separately further extend runtime, turning the compact terminal into a more self-contained solution.
While the bundled $999 invitation price sits well above the original Mini’s current $149 starting point, the included year of service and genuine untethered operation mark a clear step forward in portable satellite internet.
Elon Musk
SpaceX’s $24B Starbase supercomputer plan slipped past a key roadblock
SpaceX wants a Starbase tax break for a $24 billion gas plant and supercomputer campus.
SpaceX is asking its own company town for a tax break on a $24 billion natural gas power plant and supercomputing facility at Starbase, Texas, and the land it picked sits just outside the reach of a data center moratorium that took effect in neighboring Brownsville last week.
A City of Starbase public hearing notice says SpaceX “proposes to construct, own, and operate a gas-fired power plant and super-compute facility” on roughly 444 acres between Boca Chica Boulevard and the Port of Brownsville. The $24 billion figure covers only the initial phases, and the notice leaves room for future expansions. The Starbase City Commission will consider a property tax abatement and a related economic development agreement at a 7 p.m. hearing on December 9. The notice does not disclose the size or length of the abatement, or how much computing capacity the site would hold.
The location has a history. Over the summer, SpaceX asked Brownsville to remove the tract from its city limits and offered $220 million for water and wastewater projects in return. Brownsville approved the move in August, and Starbase later annexed the land. Brownsville’s own 90-day pause on data center applications took effect last week, and had the tract stayed inside the city, the project likely would have needed a different home.
The power side is already in front of state regulators. SpaceX has applied to the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality for air permits covering 35 mobile gas turbines producing roughly 750 megawatts, according to Politico, which also noted that two of the three Starbase commissioners voting on the incentives are SpaceX executives.
Building its own plant lets SpaceX skip the Texas grid. Gov. Greg Abbott paused new data center grid connections in August pending an audit, but a facility that generates its own electricity does not need one. The air permit still has to clear the TCEQ, where Abbott also ordered a halt on data center permits.
The bigger test arrives in January. Governor-elect Gina Hinojosa, who unseated Abbott last week, has said she will block data center approvals until the legislature passes new protections, and she has already asked state officials to hold off on any sale of Boca Chica State Park to SpaceX until she is sworn in. Tesla and SpaceX shares both fell the day after the election, and Musk’s first reaction on X was “Data centers in space looking pretty appealing right now.”
That line points to Starmind, SpaceX’s orbital compute constellation. Musk has said terrestrial compute will be “peanuts compared to orbital compute” and expects monthly orbital deployments to pass ground deployments around the end of 2028, as Teslarati reported. Until then, SpaceX still needs gigawatts on the ground. It ended the third quarter with 1.7 GW of nameplate compute, is targeting 2.5 to 3 GW by the end of this year and wants at least 10 GW more in 2027. Its existing Colossus sites around Memphis already run on gas turbines and face a lawsuit from residents over emissions.
Local reaction is split. The South Texas Environmental Justice Network has announced a protest, citing air quality, water use and energy bills, while some Brownsville residents told the Tribune they welcome the jobs. SpaceX did not respond to the Tribune’s questions about the project.
Tesla CEO Elon Musk announced that the company will extend Cybertruck production slightly to handle its extensive order backlog.
On Wednesday, Musk announced that “In order to work through more of the Cybertruck order backlog, production will be extended through the end of summer 2027.”
In order to work through more of the Cybertruck order backlog, production will be extended through the end of summer 2027
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 11, 2026
Tesla has already attempted to simplify its last months of production for the Cybertruck by eliminating several trim levels and only offering the Cyberbeast, the most expensive trim that starts at $109,990. The other two trim levels, the Cybertruck All-Wheel-Drive and Premium All-Wheel-Drive have both been discontinued.
There has been plenty of backlash against Tesla’s decision to ax the Cybertruck, but the company’s forecast prioritizes Cybercab and autonomy. Factory space at Gigafactory Texas that is not necessary is now being set aside for the Cybercab as the company truly embraces its “transportation-as-a-service” model.
There is still a slim chance the Cybertruck survives. Last evening, Tesla upfitter Unplugged Performance offered to take the Cybertruck line off of Tesla’s hands and continue building it, along with a CyberSUV.
Nevertheless, Tesla seems to be ending the Cybertruck on its terms after what will be a three-and-a-half-year run. It still does not really feel quite real; I think many of us thought the Cybertruck would be around for years to come.
Musk added more detail, stating that while it was not the smartest move, “there must be some room in this world for sentimentality or what’s the point?”
This is not the smartest move from a profit-maximizing standpoint btw, but there must be some room in this world for sentimentality or what’s the point?
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 11, 2026
Other EV pickups on the market have experienced a similar fate.
The Ford F-150 Lightning was axed by the Detroit company due to the continued losses the company took from sales. That truck was never profitable, and Ford is still taking a quarterly loss in its EV side. However, things are moving along as it has plans for a mass market EV pickup, which will likely gather some substantial demand if Ford can get it just right.
Perhaps another extension or even a total change of heart might come. Only Musk knows.
Starlink Mini 2 arrives with one feature for true off-grid connectivity
SpaceX’s $24B Starbase supercomputer plan slipped past a key roadblock
