https://sotxejn.org/2025/09/19/comments-due-by-sept-25-spacex-wants-a-permit-to-destroy-wetlands/

Dick and Richard: As you know, I always like to include maps in these kinds of stories. Sadly, I too have not been able to find any news report that outlines these details. Modern news outlets never do this basic form of news coverage. It would involve providing their readers with real information. God forbid.

Ditto about Delaware. Its Supreme Court finally got around to allowing Elon’s original 2018 pay package to stand, but it will still probably force Tesla to pay an 8-figure sum to the weasel lawyers involved in bringing the original suit.

It is, of course, hardly only Elon who is now fighting shy of Delaware. The flight from Delaware charters begun with the Tesla vendetta continues. No corporate fiduciary wants to entertain the risk of coming into the gunsights of some trigger-happy woke Delaware Chancery Court judge.

I, too, would be most interested in seeing a detailed map of the parcels involved in this prospective fed-SpaceX land swap.

Yeah, I think Elon is done with having *anything* to do with Delaware. :)

https://techxplore.com/news/2025-12-smart-composite-combines-ceramic-strength.html

Bloody tiles…worst part of bathroom renovation too….

There’s a bit of completion work to be done on both B19 and S39 but it wouldn’t surprise me to see both vehicles roll to Massey’s for pressure and cryo testing as soon as the weekend. An IFT 12 by Valentine’s Day looks increasingly doable. Assuming all goes tolerably well with IFT 12, IFT 13 could well follow in March. By mid-year, we’ll probably be seeing two Starship missions per month.

An interesting wrinkle has arisen anent the prospective SpaceX IPO. Bill Ackman, long-time pro investor and, like Elon, a man fairly recently red-pilled, has, in essence, offered to do the IPO for free through an improved SPAC-ish vehicle he calls a SPARC which he has already gotten clearance for from the SEC and created some time ago. A fly in the ointment is that this entity is chartered in Delaware, but it could evidently be repotted to TX in 60 or so days. The advantage of such a move would be the savings, to SpaceX, of hundreds of millions in bank service fees and greatly increased flexibility to preferentially offer first dibs on SpaceX shares to friendly groups such as extant Tesla investors and SpaceX fanboys. In return for use of his entity, Ackman wants to get warrants to buy $4 billion worth of the offered shares at whatever the strike price turns out to be. Given that the total offering is now likely to be $40 billion or more in total, that would make Ackman one of the largest minor shareholders in SpaceX as the IPO is likely to involve sale of less than 2% of the SpaceX shares currently outstanding. I’m hoping Elon and Ackman can come to an agreement.

I think you meant IFT 11. IFT 12 is the upcoming mission.

It would seem that you and we sunny optimists will probably wind up splitting the difference on our respective earlier estimates for IFT 12’s departure – early Feb. rather than this year or late March of next year.

I don’t think ground infrastructure readiness is going to be an issue. The cryo test infrastructure at Massey’s has been complete for some time, the ship hot-fire stand’s repairs/upgrades are perhaps a few days from completion and Pad 2’s initial readiness is not much further out. Everything about V3 boosters and ships has been revised to expedite assembly compared to the V2s. Once cryo tests are complete, for example, it probably won’t take more than a day or two for engine installs on either vehicle.

The prospective land swap with the feds is also good news. Perhaps the location of the federal parcel(s) is better aligned with SpaceX’s needs than was the abortive state-level swap. I think, ideally, that SpaceX should have more land appended to both its launch and production and test areas.

https://x.com/i/status/2003871611733295480

Still work to do, but it’s encouraging to see how quick they are already getting at stacking a booster.

So March definitely sounds doable.