By Devon Pendleton Normal text size Larger text size Very large text size Elon Musk's year of dizzying ascents hit a new apex on Monday (US time) as the Tesla co-founder passed Bill Gates to become the world's second-richest person.

JAKARTA, Indonesia - The first commercial mission for SpaceX's Starship and Super Heavy launch system will likely take place in 2021, a company executive said June 26. Jonathan Hofeller, SpaceX's vice president of commercial sales, said the company is in talks with prospective customers for the first commercial launch of that system roughly two years from now.

SpaceX launched its first set of 60 satellites last month. Now the International Astronomical Union has weighed in on the issue and underlined the potential problems to science that satellite launches could cause due to light pollution and interference with telescope and radio signals.