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THE NEW SPACE RACE: Shotwell predicts Starship to be most valuable part of SpaceX.

“The company is incredibly valuable, I think, right now because of Starlink,” she said. “Starlink will add a zero, probably, at least as we continue to grow the Starlink system.”

That growth comes in many different markets, from residential broadband services to maritime and aviation connectivity. SpaceX will begin offering direct-to-device services “within the next month or so,” she said, with an initial version for “very light data” and text messaging.

However, she argued that Starship will be even more valuable to SpaceX in the long run. “Ultimately, I think Starship will be the thing that takes us over the top as one of the most valuable companies. We can’t even envision what Starship is going to do to humanity and humans’ lives, and I think that will be the most valuable part of SpaceX.”

That is based on the belief, she said, that the fully reusable rocket with a payload capacity to low Earth orbit that could exceed 100 metric tons, will “change everything” about spaceflight, and not just with lower launch costs. “Starship is so big that the concept of how we put things in space, how people will travel in space, is totally different.”

The rest of the world has had since 2017 to match SpaceX’s Falcon 9 on reusability and price — and failed. SpaceX is working very hard to make Falcon 9 obsolete with Starship, even before any other company or country catches up to where SpaceX was almost eight years ago.

THE NEW SPACE RACE: NASA dealing with aging ISS and spacewalk hardware: ‘None of our spacesuits are spring chickens.’

Add life support to one of these babies and you’re all set.

THE NEW SPACE RACE: Russia launches Soyuz in service of Iran.

Russia launched a Soyuz rocket Monday carrying two satellites designed to monitor the space weather around Earth and 53 small satellites, including two Iranian ones, Reuters reports. The primary payloads aboard the Soyuz-2.1b rocket were two Ionosfera-M satellites to probe the ionosphere, an outer layer of the atmosphere near the edge of space. Solar activity can alter conditions in the ionosphere, impacting communications and navigation. The two Iranian satellites on this mission were named Kowsar and Hodhod. They will collect high-resolution reconnaissance imagery and support communications for Iran.

A distant third … This was only the 13th orbital launch by Russia this year, trailing far behind the United States and China. We know of two more Soyuz flights planned for later this month, but no more, barring a surprise military launch (which is possible). The projected launch rate puts Russia on pace for its quietest year of launch activity since 1961, the year Yuri Gagarin became the first person to fly in space.

That’s quite the decline.