Elon Musk Finally Shows Off SpaceX's Completed Stainless Steel 'Starship' Rocket

After months of development and weeks of teasing us with sneak-peek renders and assembly photos, Elon Musk today finally showed off the finished Starship rocket. The test rocket has left people both confused and in awe of it, and will take off later this year in March.

The astronaut suit near the bottom should give you the scale of this rocket - Elon Musk/Twitter

The Starship is the rebranded version of what was formerly the BFR, a core part of SpaceX's future launch plans. It's meant to replace the Falcon and Falcon Heavy (the previous biggest SpaceX rocket) as the primary launch vehicle for pretty much everything.

Starship test flight rocket just finished assembly at the @SpaceX Texas launch site. This is an actual picture, not a rendering. pic.twitter.com/k1HkueoXaz

¡ª Elon Musk (@elonmusk) 11 January 2019

It has been a controversial topic though because the rocket is made of stainless steel. While that is, of course, durable, it's not nearly as light as other hardy materials normally used for rockets, like titanium, aluminium, and carbon fibre. That means it would take a larger fuel load to launch the Starship into orbit. However, Musk believes the additional heat resistance the steel provides is a better suit for the rocket.

SpaceX first Starship hopper under Texas Boca Chica Beach's cloudy sky.@elonmusk #Starship #SpaceX pic.twitter.com/hVg5Ken7Vp

¡ª Evelyn Janeidy Arevalo (@JaneidyEve) 10 January 2019

This particular rocket is a test model, positioned at the Boca Chica, Texas launch site. It will be used in upcoming vertical take off and landing tests from the site in March. Once that's passed, the company can build a larger version for actual launches in 2020, which will also have a thicker fuselage and a smoother curve to the nose.