Website Follow Journey Of Elon Musk's Tesla Roadster in Space
Elon Musk's midnight cherry Tesla Roadster may have finally slipped away from any contact with Earth, space enthusiasts can still follow its path through the Solar System. Thanks to the aptly named website Whereisroadster.com, one can know the current location of the first car ever to cruise the Solar System.
The unofficial website was created by engineer Ben Pearson for the sole purpose of tracking the electric vehicle on its journey. It does this by guesstimating based on NASA's data and his own flight modeling.
The site not only gives relevant information such as the car's relevant position and speeds but also interesting tidbits of information such as the number of times the car has voided its 36,000 mile warranty and even its equivalent fuel economy if it had traveled under its own power.
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As of writing, the Roadster is currently 2,209,447 miles away from Earth, moving at a speed of 6,742 miles/hour. If it keeps on its current trajectory, it would not orbit Mars or venture into the Asteroid Belt as Musk suggested but will venture just past the red planet before being pulled back toward the center of the system.
The car is expected to make its closest approach to Mars on Oct. 7th, 2020 where it will come within just within 0.05AU of the planet. As for its home, Pearson revealed that its closest approach will not come until 2091. That is if it doesn't get blown up by the millions of debris that are currently sharing the solar system with.
Unless SpaceX or NASA actually sends a spacecraft to pick up the roadster, unofficial sits like Pearson's are probably the only way to know how the vehicle and it's driver, Starman, is doing. But with more than 70 years to go before the vehicle makes its closest approach, there's still a lot of time to do some planning for such a feat, again, assuming the vehicle is still in one piece.
