SpaceX is facing a "genuine risk of bankruptcy" amid a "production crisis" described in detail by founder and CEO Elon Musk in a companywide email.
"The Raptor production crisis is much worse than it seemed a few weeks ago," Musk wrote in a copy of the ominous email obtained by CNBC and first reported by Space Explored.
Musk later warned of the company's risk of bankruptcy "if we cannot achieve a Starship flight rate of at least once every two weeks next year."
The comments come as SpaceX has had trouble developing Raptor engines for its Starship rocket – a "massive, next-generation rocket" designed to take people and cargo to the moon and Mars.
Starship is also expected to serve as the lunar lander for the Artemis program.
Prototype testing is happening at the SpaceX facility in Boca Chica, Texas.
SpaceX CEO Elon Musk gives an update on the next-generation Starship spacecraft at the company's Texas launch facility on September 28, 2019 in Boca Chica near Brownsville, Texas. The Starship spacecraft is a massive vehicle meant to take people to the Moon, Mars, and beyond.Loren Elliott/Getty Images
In order to move to orbital launches, those prototypes could need as many as 39 Raptor engines per rocket, according to CNBC. Referring to the recent departure of a high-level SpaceX executive that was taken off the project, Musk said the challenges faced with the Raptor engines "following the exiting of prior senior management" were "far more severe than was reported," later describing it as "quite frankly, a disaster."
Musk himself said he planned to skip a planned getaway for the long Thanksgiving weekend to work "on the Raptor line all night and through the weekend," his email added.
SpaceX, a seemingly successful company that recently eclipsed the $100 billion valuation mark, is targeting the first orbital Starship flight for early 2022. In a tweet on Tuesday, Musk decried the public's view of the Starship program, calling it "not widely appreciated."
