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Now you can track Tesla Roadster's journey into space

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CIOL Writers
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Now you can track Tesla Roadster's journey into space

Elon Musk's Tesla Roadster space vehicle created history by launching into space atop the Falcon Heavy Rocket. Starman, the mannequin driver of the Tesla Roadster SpaceX is taking a trip around our solar system, in a large elliptical orbit that will bring him relatively close to Mars.

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A website has now appeared that tracks the car's journey using NASA data to track the Roadster's course. Self- proclaimed satellite guru Ben Pearson's unofficial Whereisroadster.com is tracking the EV based on NASA data and his own flight modeling (which, it turns out, is more accurate than Musk's). The site not only gives you an idea of the relative position and speed but offers fun tidbits such as the number of times the car has voided its 36,000-mile warranty and it's equivalent fuel economy if it had traveled under its own power. The website also tells you the Roadster’s current position, as well as its speed and whether it’s moving towards or away from Earth and Mars at any given moment.

The website says that "The car is 137,516,113 miles (221,310,800 km, 1.479 AU) from Mars, moving toward the planet at a speed of 43,014 miles/hour (69,225 km/hour, 19.23 km/s). The current location is 2,240,236 miles (3,605,311 km, 0.024 AU) from Earth, moving away from Earth at a speed of 6,738 miles/hour (10,844 km/hour, 3.01 km/s)."

"The car exceeded its 36,000 mile warranty 617.3 times while driving around the Sun, (22,222,954 miles, 35,764,388 km, 0.24 AU) moving at a speed of 72,990 miles/hour (117,467 km/hour, 32.63 km/s). It has achieved a fuel economy of 176.4 miles per gallon (75.0 km/liter, 1.33362 liters/100 km), assuming 126,000 gallons of fuel," the website further stated.

The website may not be a perfect way to know the location of the mannequin driver but it is the only real way of knowing what the Tesla Roadster is doing.

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