Elon Musk's Tesla Roadster Still Orbiting Mars? Astronomer Explains Why It Isn't

Elon Musk's Tesla car is orbiting Mars, or so he claimed, until a scientist rebutted his claim.

Like all-things-Musk, context is key here. In February 2018, Elon Musk's SpaceX shot a Tesla Roadster owned by Musk into space. Driven by a mannequin known as Starman, the car was attached to a SpaceX Falcon Heavy Rocket in 2018.

SpaceX

On December 6, 2021, Elon Musk wrote on Twitter - "My car is currently orbiting Mars." An ambitious statement, it's not entirely true. Last year, SpaceX claimed that the vehicle had made its first brush with Mars' orbit.

My car is currently orbiting Mars

¡ª Elon Musk (@elonmusk) December 4, 2021

But according to Jonathan Dowell, an astronomer from the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, the answer is "well, no."

Dowell went into reality check mode against Musk's claims, charting out the Roadster's orbital path in space. In essence, the vehicle is still orbiting the Sun, just bypassing parts of the Martian orbit around Sun. That's very different from orbiting Mars as a satellite would.

Since it came up today: here is the current position of the Falcon Heavy 001 second stage, with Elon Musk's Tesla bolted to its nose, together with the current positions of Earth and Mars. pic.twitter.com/HSFZveq6jJ

¡ª Jonathan McDowell (@planet4589) December 5, 2021

Using NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory Horizons system, Dowell tracked the Falcon Heavy 001 second stage, to which Elon Musk's Roadster Tesla is bolted.

The car was initially supposed to be locked into a circular obit between Mars and the Sun. But the rocket instead ended up in a different path that takes it beyond the Martian orbit in some spots.

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To complete one orbit, the Roadster takes 557 days, even longer than Earth. According to Business Insider, the rocket would take at least millions of years before crashing. Earth would most likely be where the vehicle crashes.

Tesla

Other likely crash destinations include Venus or the Sun itself - some time over the next 10 million years, at least according to researchers from the University of Toronto.

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A website also actively tracks the location of Musk's Roadster. Dowell's assessments are in line with what the website claims, suggesting that Roadster is indeed not orbiting Mars, to Musk's dismay.

Glad my math is consistent with that!

¡ª Jonathan McDowell (@planet4589) December 5, 2021

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