Rocket Lab Copies a Page From the SpaceX Playbook

Five years ago, SpaceX CEO Elon Musk made a startling announcement: His new Starship megarocket, originally designed to carry humans to Mars, might also be used to transport passengers and cargo from point-to-point here on Earth! Blasting toward orbit at many times the speed of sound, then landing again on a ballistic course, Starship would be able to travel from New York City to Shanghai, China (a 12,000 mile trip, so literally about as far as you can travel one-way on Earth) in just 40 minutes. SpaceX's prediction (which it hasn't yet proven, by the way) quickly caught the attention of the media -- and the commercial airlines, who might rightly worry what it means for their business model.