Rocket men: why tech’s biggest billionaires want their place in space
by Dan Tynan in San Francisco from Technology | The Guardian on (#24255)
Forget gilded mansions and super yachts. Among the tech elite, space exploration is now the ultimate status symbol
The explosion could be felt 30 miles away. At 9.07am on 1 September, a SpaceX rocket containing 75,000 gallons of liquid oxygen and rocket-grade kerosene ignited into a fireball that could be seen from orbit, billowing black smoke into the gray sky around its Cape Canaveral launch pad.
On board was a $200m, 12,000lb communications satellite - part of Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg's Internet.org project to deliver broadband access to sub-Saharan Africa.
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