Elon Musk reveals why he launched his Tesla Roadster into space. "I fully expected this flight to fail." Musk was talking about Falcon Heavy's first flight. Since he thought the rocket might fail, he didn't want to put something boring on top of it. Instead, SpaceX launched his personal Tesla Roadster with Starman sitting in the driver's seat. The car is now traveling in an orbit that takes it between Earth and Mars. And according to Musk, it could remain up there for around 10 million years. Imagine taking your everyday car and accidentally turning it into a piece of space history.

Falcon Heavy is still one of the most ridiculous machines humanity has ever built • 70 meters tall • 12.2 meters wide at its base • 1.42 million kg when fully fueled • 27 Merlin engines • More than 5 million pounds of thrust at liftoff • Up to 63,800 kg delivered to low-Earth orbit in expendable mode The rocket is essentially three modified Falcon 9 cores flying together: two side boosters and a strengthened center core Its first flight in February 2018 launched Elon Musk’s Tesla Roadster and Starman into orbit around the Sun Falcon Heavy has now completed 12 missions - 12 launches - 12 mission successes - Zero mission failures When the mission profile allows, its two side boosters detach, reverse direction and land vertically within seconds of each other so they can be reused Three rockets flying as one Twenty-seven engines producing more than 5 million pounds of thrust and somehow SpaceX made it look routine