How Much Fuel Does It Take To Get To The Moon?

[Rhiannon12866]

The new age space race is upon us as Elon Musk’s SpaceX gears up to send billionaires to the moon and NASA plans for upcoming missions this month at Kennedy Space Center and Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. So naturally, inquiring minds want to know: just how much fuel does it take to get to the moon?

Next Sunday, August 13 a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket will blast off from Kennedy Space Center aimed for NASA's International Space Station. The Dragon spacecraft is an unmanned capsule that will fly with 3 tonnes of supplies, small potatoes next to their ambitious goal of sending two space tourists to the moon in 2018, their first mission with humans on board the spacecraft.

The cost for a single load of fuel for the SpaceX Dragon spacecraft, presumably a more austere model than the one that will be used for space tourism in the near future, is between $200,000 and $300,000. Makes you think twice about complaining about how much is costs to fill your Range Rover!

Now for a bit of history: for the 1967 Apollo mission to the moon, Saturn V rocket’s first stage carried 203,400 gallons of kerosene fuel and 318,000 gallons of liquid oxygen needed for, totaling over 500,000 gallons of fuel for getting out of the atmosphere alone. The second stage carried another 260,000 gallons of liquid hydrogen and 80,000 gallons of liquid oxygen. The third stage carries 66,700 gallons of liquid hydrogen and 19,359 gallons of liquid oxygen. All told, the rocket that achieved one small step for a man and one giant leap for mankind held just under 950,000 gallons of fuel.

Since then, space age technologies have come a long way. By comparison, SpaceX’s Falcon 9 uses just a mere fraction of the fuel combusted by Saturn V. To be fair, the Falcon 9 is smaller, simpler, and not designed to re-enter orbit safely (it has no stage three), but even so, you can see that the fuel efficiency of spacecrafts has improved leaps and bounds.


More: http://oilprice.com/Energy/Energy-General/How-Much-Fuel-Does-It-Take-To-Get-To-The-Moon.html

[SeattleVet]

1. "1967 Apollo mission to the moon"?

First manned lunar orbit in Apollo was late 1968; first landing was mid 1969. There were no manned Apollo flights in 1967. The capsule fire that killed Grissom, White, and Chaffee was in January of 1967; there were no manned flights until the following year.

[Rhiannon12866]

2. You are absolutely right! I wasn't reading the dates!

I sure remember the moon landing, a huge event when I was a kid! Who doesn't? I posted this for the gas aspect, but maybe I should delete.

[Dennis Donovan]

3. K&R - interesting story

They got the year wrong of the first actual trip to the moon, but, technically there was an Apollo mission in 1967. Unfortunately, it ended in tragedy and never made it off the pad.

[Rhiannon12866]

4. I'm aware of that.

It's unbelievable they'd get that wrong, of all things. It was a national tragedy.

[pscot]

5. Less fuel than it takes

to move a carrier task force from San Diego to the Sea of Japan.

[hunter]

6. In my feckless wasted youth I did some environmental research...

... about the Space Shuttle's solid rocket boosters and similar less public technology.

But anyone like me who has been driving automobiles around for decades and flown on commercial airliners can't claim any moral high ground.