Does "reach" mean enter Mars orbit?

I don't think it's so unlikely. To send a ship to mars, they "only" need a fully fueled ship in low earth orbit. It may be the case that they need to do that anyway as a demonstration for the Artemis program. If they have fueled the ship in such a test, they only need to push the button and send it off to mars. So i would guess like a 55% chance they do that in 2026, when such demonstrations may be needed on the Artemis timeline.

@drive I mean they're already launching the vehicles with little hope of recovery lol, why wouldn't they just launch one at mars and gather all that data

I don’t think that a starship will resch mars boy 2030. It‘s not so unlikely, however I think it will be to hard to manage until 2030. Until 2040 I think it’s quite save that a starship will reach mars.

Flyby included I guess? E.g. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crocco%27s_Multiplanetary_Trajectory

https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1768810190718009446?t=8qFkM5OYWrWSvqv58HQE_Q&s=19

This would be an exciting market to lose money on.

I believe this question is referring to whether a Starship will land successfully on Mars by 2030. Am I right, or is there anything else?

@bohaska Well, Gigacasting commented that orbiting Mars without landing also counts.

Simply put, I believe Elon Musk is a conman along the same vein as Elisabeth Holmes but simply more extreme and yet to be fully noticed. Thusly, anything he is involved with should be looked at with deep suspicion in my opinion. He frequently misses deadlines and does not deliver on promises when it comes to works and businesses such as the Hyperloop, Cyber-truck and SpaceX as well. Even rudimentary research would show this but I personally would recommend the work of Thunderf00t on YouTube or Common Sense Skeptic or if one is more reading inclined this article should suffice:

https://medium.com/@DevinGates/elon-musk-the-man-the-myth-the-con-75b7aee73e90

There will be no landing on Mars by SpaceX let alone colonization of the planet. Mark my words. This man and everything he's involved with are just over-promised cons.

@AwaleAbdi you are dumb please tell me how equating missed deadline and conman works.

@AwaleAbdi I agree mostly, but SpaceX seems to be doing great despite him

@AwaleAbdi I feel like this is a spam comment unless you bet on it.

Near Mars; with or without people