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They’ve been pretty transparent that the plan is for hundreds of starships. Not just one. Obviously they can’t do it with just one ship. A lot of the issues you

They’ve been pretty transparent that the plan is for hundreds of starships. Not just one. Obviously they can’t do it with just one ship. A lot of the issues you’re referencing decrease dramatically with every additional ship. Hundreds of tons of cargo to unload? Not really an issue if you give them a lot of heavy equipment. Energy requirements would be pretty small. Oxygen and water for a few dozen people is a solved problem on subs. Radiation is sort of solved if you live on the ship after landing. You’ll still probably die of course but the point stands that the logistics side of the equation seems fine with startships.

ncmncm 4y ago
You need the hundreds of ships just to get the fuel for a few Mars ships to orbital refueling depots. If one crewed ship of 8 colonists needs, say, five cargo ships for support equipment for that population on Mars, and a seventh as counterweight for centrifugal gravity en route, that is 77 launches. The six that land on Mars don't get re-used, although their superheavies do. The point here is that you need an absurdly large number of launch events just to provide for 8 colonists. Multiply that out to a million colonists, and you exceed the industrial capacity of the world. And, even a million colonists is very, very, very far from self-sufficient.
- oneoff786 4y ago
  77 launches isn’t absurd. It is BELOW what spaceX is planning for. There’s nothing remotely sensible about a million colonists, so that’s a pointless straw man. Lastly, the necessities to support 8 people aren’t that different from the necessities to support 100. They scale wayyy better than linearly. Again, the issue with supporting people on mars is not the vehicles to get there.
  - ncmncm 4y ago
    10 superheavy launches per colonist does not admit 1M colonists, and 1M colonists is at least two orders of magnitude short of self-sufficient. It is very far from clear that Mars can physically support 100M inhabitants.
    - oneoff786 4y ago
      Again, nobody is saying anything about 1M colonists. That’s a stupidly high number. 100M is 100x stupider
      - ncmncm 4y ago
        Musk blathers about 1M colonists all the damn time. Almost embarrassed for him: not sure whether because he believes it could happen, or would be enough.

ncmncm 4y ago

You need the hundreds of ships just to get the fuel for a few Mars ships to orbital refueling depots. If one crewed ship of 8 colonists needs, say, five cargo ships for support equipment for that population on Mars, and a seventh as counterweight for centrifugal gravity en route, that is 77 launches. The six that land on Mars don't get re-used, although their superheavies do. The point here is that you need an absurdly large number of launch events just to provide for 8 colonists. Multiply that out to a million colonists, and you exceed the industrial capacity of the world. And, even a million colonists is very, very, very far from self-sufficient.

oneoff786 4y ago
77 launches isn’t absurd. It is BELOW what spaceX is planning for. There’s nothing remotely sensible about a million colonists, so that’s a pointless straw man. Lastly, the necessities to support 8 people aren’t that different from the necessities to support 100. They scale wayyy better than linearly. Again, the issue with supporting people on mars is not the vehicles to get there.
- ncmncm 4y ago
  10 superheavy launches per colonist does not admit 1M colonists, and 1M colonists is at least two orders of magnitude short of self-sufficient. It is very far from clear that Mars can physically support 100M inhabitants.
  - oneoff786 4y ago
    Again, nobody is saying anything about 1M colonists. That’s a stupidly high number. 100M is 100x stupider
    - ncmncm 4y ago
      Musk blathers about 1M colonists all the damn time. Almost embarrassed for him: not sure whether because he believes it could happen, or would be enough.