Tesla Roadster, Starman venture beyond Mars’ orbit

Months after SpaceX launched its Tesla Roadster and dummy driver Starman in space to capture epic views, the payload has finally passed Mars’ orbit.

Back in February Elon Musk’s SpaceX launched a payload of Starman in a Tesla Roadster aiming to provide epic views of outer space. SpaceX recently confirmed that the sports car has passed beyond Mars’ orbit, putting it one of the greatest distances away from the sun.

The car and the mannequin will reach its far point on November 8 this year being 155 million miles away from home planet. Also, now that Starman is at its far point, it will be a long time before it makes its closest approach to Earth again – not until November 4, 2020 and even then being 32 million miles away, reported Engadget.

Tesla Roadster floating through space will give ‘epic views’

SpaceX tweeted an orbit diagram of Starman’s current location, further captioning, ‘Next stop, the restaurant at the end of the universe.’

Starman’s current location. Next stop, the restaurant at the end of the universe. pic.twitter.com/Ty5m8IjJpE

— SpaceX (@SpaceX) November 3, 2018

However, on October 6, 2020, Starman will be much closer to Mars, being 4.6 million miles away. An actual close pass-by from Earth will be until 2091, as per an orbit-modeling study. The study authors also informed that the car will crash to either Venus or Earth probably within the next few thousands of millions of years. There is a 6% chance of hitting Earth in the next one million years, and a 2.5% chance of slamming Venus in the same time span, reported Space.com.