Proposed Starship flight path for landing at Boca Chica,
avoiding Mexico

According to statements made this week by Mexico’s president Claudia Sheinbaum, it has abandoned for now its plan to sue SpaceX over the Superheavy debris dropped in the Gulf of Mexico during launches.

Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum, who said last year that her government was weighing a lawsuit against the Elon Musk-led space company, said it has shelved that plan in favor of continued negotiations. “So far, things have worked reasonably well; if a lawsuit were to become necessary, we would evaluate it, but for now, we have opted for coordination,” she told reporters this week, according to Mexican media outlets.

The claims by Mexico and a bunch of leftist activist groups have generally been bogus. First, the amount of debris has exaggerated. Second, the amount has declined to practically nothing as SpaceX has refined the design and operation of Starship and Superheavy with each test flight. Third, SpaceX has taken aggressive action to salvage the Superheavies it has landed in the Gulf.

Finally, I suspect the Trump administration has been applying pressure on Mexico to back off. This pressure has also come parallel to efforts by SpaceX to minimize its footprint over Mexico. For example, it is reviewing new flight paths for Starship that would avoid flying over Mexico in returning to Boca Chica.

In sum, Mexico’s threats were simply another example of leftist “Chicken Little” whining, throwing a tantrum in order to try to get its way. The adults in the room (Trump and the people at SpaceX) did what adults do, ignored the screaming while telling the toddler to stop acting like a baby. While it is unlikely the leftist toddler will grow up, that really doesn’t matter at this point. Starship and Superheavy are launching.