In what must be the fanciest publicity stunt in history, Elon Musk’s SpaceX program will launch its Falcon Heavy rocket into space for the first time today. The rocket will eventually launch its payload, an exposed Tesla Roadster, into orbit around Mars. If all goes according to plan, it’ll eventually float beyond Mars, and if it doesn’t explode on takeoff, it’ll be out in space for a billion years. Musk has also said that the car is going to be playing David Bowie’s “Space Oddity” — a song about an astronaut who is lost forever to the void, a strange decision for a scientific mission like this. (There’s no sound in space, anyway, so I guess we shouldn’t complain too much.) Musk has shared a CGI mock-up of the way the mission is supposed to go, and it’s set to “Life On Mars?,” which is a way more appropriate choice. Check it out below, via the Verge.

That’s a dummy astronaut in the driver’s seat, by the way. Musk isn’t condemning a human being to the fate of Major Tom.

UPDATE: Success…

Printed on the circuit board of a car in deep space

A post shared by Elon Musk (@elonmusk) on Feb 6, 2018 at 2:40pm PST