On Feb. 6, 2018, SpaceX, Elon Musk’s innovative space travel company, sent a rocket, named the Falcon Heavy  into space for a price far lower than what could have been achieved by NASA. It is not only the price of this rocket that makes it unusual though, as its primary payload was a car.

The Falcon Heavy did not bring just any car to space though. The car that it brought to orbit around the sun is Musk’s own Midnight-Cherry Tesla roadster, which is now headed in the general direction of Mars. While the car will not reach the planet of Mars, it will come fairly close to the red planet. According to Science Alert, the roadster itself is carrying another much smaller payload called an Arch.

The Arch, pronounced “ark,” is an incredibly small disc shaped data storage device made from quartz. The device was made by the Arch Mission Foundation and according to Science Alert, the Arch can hold up to 360 terabytes of data which is similar to the amount of storage on 7,000 Blu-Ray DVDs. Yet, this Arch is only carrying Issac Asimov’s Foundation trilogy. However, the Arch is not the only impressive piece of technology involved with the Falcon Heavy rocket.

Two of the three stage-one engines aboard the Falcon Heavy were able to be landed and recovered by SpaceX, but, according to Gizmodo, the central engine crashed into the ocean at 300 miles per hour; turning the state of the art, self-guided engine into scrap metal that was quickly swallowed by the sea. Considering that this is the first test of the Falcon Heavy, a two out of three-recovery rate is remarkably high.

One thing that is not remarkably high about the Falcon Heavy is the price to launch one of the huge payload rockets into orbit. According to Time Magazine it costs about 90 million dollars to launch a Falcon Heavy. That may seem like a steep price, but it is incredibly low compared to a typical NASA launch which can cost upward of one billion dollars.

Although this mission did not take a man to Mars, SpaceX has proven advanced space flight technology vehicle at a reduced cost is feasible. The success of this mission only goes to prove that Musk has built a competent company, one which can rival even NASA’s space flight prowess.