SpaceX Wins Environmental Approval for Launch of Mars Rocket (nytimes.com) 94
There are no environmental showstoppers in SpaceX's plans to launch a giant new rocket to orbit from South Texas, the Federal Aviation Administration said on Monday. From a report: An environmental assessment by the agency has concluded that SpaceX's plans for orbital launches will have "no significant impact" on the region along the Gulf Coast near Brownsville, Texas. But the F.A.A. is also requiring the company to undertake more than 75 actions to minimize the impact on the surrounding areas as it begins flights of Starship, a vehicle that is central to NASA's plans to return to the moon as well as the vision of Elon Musk, the company's founder and chief executive, to colonize Mars. The actions Mr. Musk's company must take include earlier notice of launches, monitoring of vegetation and wildlife by a biologist, coordination with state and federal agencies to remove launch debris from sensitive habitats and adjustment of lighting to lessen impact on wildlife and a nearby beach. The mitigation measures required by the F.A.A. also restrict closures of a highway that passes the SpaceX site during launches so that people can visit the nearby beach, park and wildlife refuge. The agency said the highway could not be closed on 18 holidays and not on more than five weekends a year.
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Planetary Protection Rules don't apply to Earth, silly!
(You mean, don't apply to rockets orbiting Earth, I assume.)
Re:This is a mistake (Score:4, Insightful)
""Planetary Protection"? That's a laugh, have you seen the state of the Earth?"
Have you seen South-Texas?
There's no environment to ruin.
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Nonsequitur.
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Don't worry. 10 years ago Musk said he would have a man on Mars in 10 years. There is plenty of time to sort this out.
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or if he doesn't give up that "starting a new nation" crap.
And why should he give up that?
If I would join a mars colony - with no way of return obviously I want to be in my own new nation - or do you think German in a Space-X colony on Mars falls under German law?
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How would a Mars nation function? All the plans thus far are reliant on supplies being delivered from Earth.
It would need some kind of economy to buy supplies from Earth, at great cost. Given the cost of getting anything back from Mars, it's unlikely it could sustain itself financially. Meaning it would need to be funded from Earth, and therefore be covered by Earth law at least in part.
There is also the issue of the very small population size. Democracy doesn't tend to work well with very small island nati
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There is also the issue of the very small population size. Democracy doesn't tend to work well with very small island nations, and I don't see why it would be better on Mars.
I think it is the opposite around.
Democracy only works in small nations.
All the plans thus far are reliant on supplies being delivered from Earth.
Supplies and trade has nothing to do with the way how a colony would govern itself.
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All the best democracies are medium sized. A few million people. Too small or too large and they seem to have issues. There are exceptions, the EU isn't a government as such but it is democratic and it mostly works quite well.
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Underjustified claim; small democracies have very similar issues.
You might better argue that small towns have self-governance and some nice features of small town democracy degrade after that, but small towns are not really a viable model for nations.
And the EU doesn't at all work well (in its current form, at least).
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And the EU doesn't at all work well (in its current form, at least).
Most citizens: disagree. The EU is working very well, especially if you consider its ambitions.
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All the top ranked countries for strong democracy and quality of life are small ones, mostly in Europe and mostly in the EU or EEA.
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Like the nation of Athens, which invented democracy.
Re:This is a mistake (Score:4, Interesting)
Just speculating here of course... has anyone ever done the numbers on the economics of an early Mars colony?
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Given that inhabiting Mars is going to involve sending a lot of smart people to a challenging environment, I'd expect they're going to be inventing a lot of new technologies to cope with it. So expect the major export of Mars to be intellectual property.
That's probably the only major export you'll get from Mars. Nothing else can be produced economically enough to make it worth transporting to Earth. A license for a patent doesn't need to be flown back to Earth on a rocket.
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Other IP would be science and "movie footage" - aka interviews and real "reality shows".
Re:This is a mistake (Score:4, Informative)
My assumption is primarily ice mining - Sabatier and related processes converting water ice and atmospheric CO2 to oxygen and fuel. Given the lower cost per mass to orbit from Mars surface, getting it back to mars orbit and then on to a long, low energy orbit back to earth for then use by other space companies. It'll also kick off a belter-type economy - if you can get the ice while its already in space, you save on the energy cost of the lift from the martian surface.
Also, there are SO many areas of research which will benefit earth, and thus have value - low resource, low energy input production of food ( hydroponics / vertical farming style methods ) can be recreated on earth to feed the increasing population.
My assumption is that if Elon is pushing this, he will aim for self-reliance for the majority of key resources as quickly as possible, at which point it doesnt need to generate an 'income'...
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I hadn't really thought about it that way, but likely it would be cheaper, energy wise, to resupply the ISS from Mars than from Earth, due to the massive lift costs from the Earth. At least if fuel production is otherwise equal, which would take a while on Mars.
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Perhaps you want to look into this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
A concept for a perpetual cycling spacecraft (actually a chain of them) between Mars and Earth, by Buzz Aldrin.
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Wasn't it until recently that only nation state had space going rockets?
And arn't there some private organisations which are in the process of building their own space stations? (again previously only possible by nation states).
I will not be surprised if some billionaires decide to "invest" in a mars colony, so that anything of value produced and sold, they may get some profit.
I can see demand on earth for "martian art", created by some artists in Mars. At the least for the snob appeal. Or anything else fro
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How would a Mars nation function? All the plans thus far are reliant on supplies being delivered from Earth.
This is a good point, at the very least a Mars nation would have to be bootstrapped from a dependent colony, it could not just start out that way. I do think that could happen though. I'm not sure if you do. We can get into the perennial argument over whether a Mars settlement could ever become self-sustaining. I tend to think it could, eventually. At least it seems like most of its needs could be met with in situ resource utilization once the industrial base is built up enough to reach a critical mass. Loo
Pretty obvious (Score:1)
It would need some kind of economy to buy supplies from Earth, at great cost. Given the cost of getting anything back from Mars, it's unlikely it could sustain itself financially.
It's pretty obvious how it maintains stable funding, land sales hooking up to local utilities. The "nation" gains money through land sales until it's of a size where other industry produces income.
Democracy doesn't tend to work well with very small island nations
Maybe it's different in an environment where no-one can afford to be
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Democracy doesn't tend to work well with very small island nations,
What?
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Democracy doesn't tend to work well
FTFY
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I have them. But somehow you posted the same post to two persons it seems.
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SpaceX has never proposed no way of return - on the contrary, they've proposed free return tickets included with your outgoing ticket.
A German in Antarctica falls under German law.
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SpaceX has never proposed no way of return - on the contrary, they've proposed free return tickets included with your outgoing ticket.
That was not my point.
A German in Antarctica falls under German law.
No, he does not. He falls under the law of the local jurisdiction.
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SpaceX has never proposed no way of return - on the contrary, they've proposed free return tickets included with your outgoing ticket. That was not my point.
A German in Antarctica falls under German law.
No, he does not. He falls under the law of the local jurisdiction.
Actually this is not 100% true, a lot of (all ?) countries have extraterritorial laws [ouplaw.com] that act upon their citizens/companies abroad on top of the local jurisdiction.
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Yes, "on top", and only in rare cases like child abuse.
They would not cover anything like a "simple fraud".
Point is: when i go to Antarctica, I'm there in a "facility", or on a ship. If I'm on a ship, the law of the country the ship is registered applies, if it is a facility, liek a station, the laws of the country(s) the station belongs to, applies.
As long as I do not commit a capital crime, and I'm not from a country that has "extraterritorial laws", my home country laws are irrelevant.
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Yes, "on top", and only in rare cases like child abuse.
Don't forget about tax laws, some extraterritorial drug laws, no biz with certain countries or their representatives laws, extraterritorial data privacy laws, extraterrestrial prostitution laws, extraterritorial child labor laws etc. There are also a bunch of laws that can apply to civilians before they leave for mars which are passive (some risk laws, passport laws etc.). Eg. is the Mars base US territory, does it recognize diplomatic conventions ? Anyways, my point is that it wouldn't be difficult for cou
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Anyways, my point is that it wouldn't be difficult for countries/states or power blocks to create new extraterritorial laws which would apply.
They would not apply. As I'm on Mars. How the funk would they force me to surrender to an earth law? Taking my family hostage?
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As for "starting a new nation", you can be sure that those Planetary Protection rules will be revisited, when founding a permanent colony on Mars becomes viable. I wouldn't worry about that too much; while I am glad of Musk's drive to push space exploration, I doubt we'll see a prac
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I'm pretty sure that during the next 10 years, both Space-X, and as well the Chinese will start launching.
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Fuck those rules. I don't remember being asked when they made the decision for everyone.
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The fact that HLS has been given to the Starship program means more than a one off contract, it's implicit NASA approval that they want to work with SpaceX on the vehicle program and future launches. It's the first step in a partnership.
Indeed SpaceX is going to have to prove the platform first and most of its primary goals in getting to the moon. Once that is done there will be a lot of work to get the system prepared for a journey to Mars which will be years after that.
Assuming the HLS mission is succes
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No approval for launch should be given if either he can't guarantee compliance with Planetary Protection Rules.
Planetary protection is written into the 1967 Treaty on Outer Space, which, since it was ratified by the president and senate, has the force of law in the US.
(Although the headline says "Mars Rocket," the FAA approval is about launch to orbit, not to Mars, so the issue is moot in any case.)
or if he doesn't give up that "starting a new nation" crap.
I don't believe that the FAA has jurisdiction over what Musk says.
Re: This is a mistake (Score:2)
link to the doc (Score:1)
does any one have a link to the document i can not find it. on the Faa site i checked last night
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Re:Road closures? (Score:5, Informative)
The Federal Aviation Administration can stipulate how often a road can be closed? Thats quite an overstretch.
I'm not entirely sure what your criticism here is? Do you think it's an overstretch that roads are able to be closed by the authority of the FAA at all, and that for this reason SpaceX shouldn't be allowed to launch from there at all? Or are you complaining that the FAA shouldn't be able to dictate towards SpaceX how often a road should be closed? If it's the latter your criticism doesn't make sense at all, because the road is only closed by the authority of the FAA, so it is in their purview to decide about limitations, while taking into consideration any existing other laws and regulations. And if it's the former, take it up with Congress, because roads being closed by the authority of the FAA related to space launches is nothing new.
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The FAA is also dictating that SpaceX pay for new signage on a historical site and other ridiculous things that are entirely unrelated to aviation.
Welcome the new governmental overlords, same as the old ones...
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Do you think it's an overstretch that roads are able to be closed by the authority of the FAA at all, and that for this reason SpaceX shouldn't be allowed to launch from there at all?
I also agree. I don't think the FAA should have such power. It should be left up to local governments whether or not they want to allow roads to be closed, for what purpose and for how long.
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Pathetic paper pushers satisified (Score:2)
Yes, we need to protect the environment.
No, requiring progress to wait on government bureacrat drones slowly filling in forms is not a good way to do that.
And letting them slow down progress by adding jobs the local government can't be bothered to do is simply disgusting corruption.
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You did not even read the report summary, did you?
Boca Chica is not like some missile range in the remote desert. It is in a sensitive coastal location, so there will be care needed. They knew it when they built there.
Re:Pathetic paper pushers satisified (Score:4, Informative)
"Sensitive costal location" that goes 10 feet under water for 3-5 days every time a hurricane hits, which is about every 5-7 years. Of all the coastal wetland area, this is the most hell-blasted portion of it, and why there's no unique endangered mammals in the area. Every time a hurricane hits they all drown, and it has to be repopulated. I used to do a lot of coastal sailing in this area, I'm very familiar with the ground truth here. There are a bunch of migratory birds but a 5 acre site isn't a tremendous impact in the area; you can't even pick out the factory from an aerial photo unless you're zoomed in quite a bit.
The area might be best described as "vegitated wasteland". If there was anything for the environmentalists to cling to here, it would be in the news. The most valuable land nearby is a virtually unknown civil war battlefield, which is of arguable value considering what the confederates represented (slavery)
Short of the middle of the desert, ecologically this is a pretty good place to build a rocket launch pad/factory.
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The Confederates did not represent slavery
All you have to do is read their declarations of independence to know that is false.
If it weren't for slavery, the South wouldn't have tried to secede, and the North wouldn't have tried to stop them if they did.
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Wow, you obviously are uneducated in history.
I assure you, I am not.
The only interest in slavery anyone had, was economic.
Of course, they weren't trying to educate their slaves.
I should add, we should erect statues to Lee all over the north, for single handedly giving victory to the North, considering his miserable battle tactics, strategies, and overall plans. If it hadn't been for Lee, the North would have had trouble winning the war. Hats off to Mr Lee!
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But but but...there's a historical site there!
It's OK though, SpaceX is required to pay for 5 new multi-lingual signs in the area and write some kind of book report about what happened.
What this has to do with launching rockets though, I'm clueless. But honestly, if that kind of chickenshit 'requirements' makes someone sign off on their launch site, it's 1000x easier to just do it and not argue.
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Yes, it's fairly easy for Spacex to fix up some signs and put a star back on another one.
But that has nothing to do with Spacex.
Local tax money should have been used to do that and it is a sign of a broken, corrupt system that local politicians can throw stuff like that into an environmental impact report.
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Short of the middle of the desert, ecologically this is a pretty good place to build a rocket launch pad/factory.
I agree with you. Just saying that unlike a patch of desert, environmental consideration and public access should not be ignored completely.
Its not as if the FAA is what is actually holding up progress.
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"Its not as if the FAA is what is actually holding up progress."
Will having to drop the power plant hold up progress ?
Will having to drop the desalination plant hold up progress ?
Will limiting Spacex to 5 launches per year hold up progress ?
I don't know, but neither do you.
I fear it will.
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"Sensitive costal location" that goes 10 feet under water for 3-5 days every time a hurricane hits, which is about every 5-7 years. Of all the coastal wetland area, this is the most hell-blasted portion of it, and why there's no unique endangered mammals in the area. Every time a hurricane hits they all drown, and it has to be repopulated. I used to do a lot of coastal sailing in this area, I'm very familiar with the ground truth here. There are a bunch of migratory birds but a 5 acre site isn't a tremendous impact in the area; you can't even pick out the factory from an aerial photo unless you're zoomed in quite a bit. The area might be best described as "vegitated wasteland". If there was anything for the environmentalists to cling to here, it would be in the news.
LOL. You obviously have no clue how the environmentalists work. Of course this is a point of interest: a company, with deep pockets, and controversial leader that leftists already hate, trying to do construction work AND rockets. This is going to be one of the easiest shakedowns ever, and you bet they'll find tons of endangered species there, even if they have to bring them there themselves.
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You did not even comprehend my comment, did you?
Here it is again. Maybe look up the big words this time.
"Yes, we need to protect the environment.
No, requiring progress to wait on government bureacrat drones slowly filling in forms is not a good way to do that.
And letting them slow down progress by adding jobs the local government can't be bothered to do is simply disgusting corruption."
Sweet! (Score:3)
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Cheap, easy, and regular access to space has huge benefit to science - which equally provides huge benefit to the world.
Worry about polluting cars, the not-actually-recycling programs for plastics, disposable-everything culture, etc. if you want to worry about the environment. There are so many areas multiple orders of magnitude greater in impact to focus on.
But hey, the non sequitur ar-15 argument...i guess you just win
Re:disturbing (Score:5, Insightful)
SpaceX has lawyers and they knew all along that working out of Boca Chica would eventually require a review process. This is the first brand new launch site in awhile on US soil and in an entirely new environment and locale.
In south Texas they had more and cheaper land to occupy but the cost is getting through the regulatory hurdles and really they got what they wanted in the end.
If the goal was to minimize the amount of red tape they could have just built this all around the Florida Space Coast, you know, that entire area the government operates and has already cleared for launches for the past 70 years. Indeed that was the backup plan for SpaceX all along.
I can agree that in the face of more frequent launches the FAA needs to revise its processes and they are but something like this can't just take place with zero oversight and there is decades of corporate mismanagement and destruction of environments to back that idea up.
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That's one way to think about it. Or it could be that there is so much red tape at the Cape, there is better access to a lot of appropriate labor (welders/heavy construction), it is closer to their headquarters, it is one of only two locations in the continental US so close to the equator, it is one of the few locations left in the US on a easterly coastline with appropriate buffer zones from populated areas, etc that made Boca Chica such a good location for a launch site that SpaceX went through all of th
Re: disturbing (Score:2)
Red tape? No, probably not. There are dozens of pads at Canaveral, in fact they are building a second Starship launch platform there right now. It's also home to dozens of contractors and tons of aerospace labor. Everything is a known quantity there, there's a hundred reasons they decided to make a literal dedicated space center.
Would it be more expensive? Absolutely. Do they potentially (all flights are at the behest of FAA no matter) have more freedom there? Maybe.
Now, would they be able to do everyth
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Evidence I have none, but it seemed to me as this thing dragged on with continual delays on the part of the FAA, that the whole point was not environmental protection, but rather making sure the Senate Launch System exploded, I mean launched, before SpaceX's Super Heavy + Starship. I guess that is in doubt now, with the SLS launch being who knows when--but then we don't know when SH+S might launch, either.
Why can’t we build things anymore in the US? (Score:3)
"The company will also contribute to local education and preservation efforts — including preparing a historical context report of the events of the Mexican War and the Civil War that took place in the area as well as replacing missing ornaments on a local historical marker."
https://www.cnbc.com/2022/06/1... [cnbc.com]
Re: Why can't we build things anymore in the US? (Score:2)
I don't know if you're aware of the "enclosures" in Britain, where land that formerly has been for use by everyone got parceled up and signed ownership. It had the positive effect of avoiding the tragedy of the commons, where no one was willing to invest in improving the land because they wouldn't reap much reward themselves. But it has the negative effect of condemning the now landless folks to poverty, and their descendants too.
It seems to me a no brainier that if SpaceX gets to impinge on the common good
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If the exposed part of the road were a tunnel... (Score:2)
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Pretty much any tunnel in that area would be below sea level. It would likely require some big honking pumps as well since that area floods during heavy storms.
Perhaps an above ground concrete tunnel would work better?
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An above ground reinforced concrete tunnel with overfill capable of withstanding a crashing rocket ... and you thought this study took a while!
It's far easier to close the road as needed. At some point if that becomes too frequent they can always review it again.
Heck, if SS attains the safety record they're aiming for then a lot of 'old way' rules could be revisited. These days cars and people can be right under the final approach path for aircraft.
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I think SpaceX have already been toying around with the idea of a tunnel to the beach to overcome the access issue, though I don't think they're planning on putting it anywhere near the launch/build site. If you look on Google maps the beach goes right up to the town(?) of South Padre Island. The only thing separating it from the beach is a channel to a harbor, a few thousand feet at it's widest. It probably wouldn't be cheap but it would work, and probably wouldn't even need to support vehicle traffic,
None of this was required in the 1960s (Score:2)
Nobody cared about any of these issues during the Apollo program. Kowtowing to them now only sets the US back. It's typical government gatekeeping. They have to justify their existence so the keep throwing tire-poppers in the road just to be able to say that they did something.
Re:None of this was required in the 1960s (Score:4, Insightful)
There weren't nearly so many Superfund sites back in the 60's either. As the article pointed out, none of the FAA stipulations are showstoppers and the launches will move forward.
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Neither were seatbelts (till 1968) so what point are you actually making? That people weren't as aware of the risks and impact of their decisions or that we should now, knowingly, just ignore anything that might be harmful.
Is it governmental gatekeeping? X == 100%.
Is if necessary governmental gatekeeping? 0% https://www.faa.gov/sites/faa....
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https://www.faa.gov/sites/faa.... [faa.gov]
Only a mile from Mexico (Score:1)
What does Mexico think of having Mars launches so close by? It's doubtful Musk cares of course, but Boca Chica is right on the US/Mexico border.
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A statement from K'Brell (Score:2)
Earthlings !
We have seen thru your veiled lies, your so called hastily approved "test orbital launches" are just invasion preparations.
Mars will NOT falter !
If any of those silvery invasion ships reaches two karads above the wet surface of your planet, we will commence redirecting the asteroids towards your breeding grounds.
-- K'Brell and the Mars Council of Elders