SpaceX will have to wait until its next test flight of Starship to recover all parts of the giant rocket in a single mission.
The company had hoped to execute a milestone “double-catch” maneuver during the flight that launched on Friday from South Texas. That will be a key step toward SpaceX’s goal of developing a fully reusable rocket.
Until recent years, rockets have generally been expensive, single-use throwaways. If all of Starship, which is the largest rocket ever built, can be repeatedly flown, it would revolutionize the space industry, enabling launches of bigger, heavier satellites and other cargo at lower costs.
In addition, NASA is counting on a version of Starship to serve as a lunar lander for its Artemis program. The catches are not needed for NASA’s Artemis III mission next year, but any failures would make it even more unlikely that NASA could meet its goal of landing astronauts on the moon in 2028.
When is the launch, and how can I watch it?
Starship launched on schedule at 5:47 p.m. Eastern time from its Starbase site outside Brownsville, Texas, into a clear azure sky, even as the Federal Aviation Administration issued a nationwide ground stop for air travel.
You can watch SpaceX’s coverage in the player above.
As the booster headed back to the launchpad, the commentators on SpaceX’s webcast said the attempted catch was called off. Instead, the booster made a simulated landing over the Gulf of Mexico, which ended with a loud explosion.
What is Starship?
At 407 feet tall, Starship is the largest and most powerful rocket ever built. It consists of two pieces: a powerful booster stage with 33 engines known as the Super Heavy, and an upper-stage spacecraft, also called Starship and often shortened to Ship.
“It’s designed for not just full reusability but also rapid reusability, like an aircraft,” Elon Musk, the founder and chief executive of SpaceX, said in September during the All-In Summit, a business and technology conference.
A previous Starship test flight in September was the first to enter orbit around Earth. The mission successfully deployed 26 of SpaceX’s newest Starlink satellites, which have become operational pieces of the internet communications network.
What is happening during this flight?
This is the 15th test flight of Starship. After launching from the southern tip of Texas, the rocket headed eastward over the Gulf of Mexico.
The SpaceX webcast commentators said they did not know why the booster catch attempt was called off.
The upper-stage Ship continued upward to orbit, about 170 miles above Earth, where it deployed another batch of 26 Starlink satellites.
After 22 hours and about 14 trips around the planet, Ship will drop out of orbit and head back to the launch site, where it is to be caught by the mechanical arms on the launch tower.
Is there any danger as Ship crosses the United States toward landing?
During Flight 14, SpaceX showed that it could restart an engine on the upper-stage Ship, allowing the craft to first enter a circular orbit and then to drop out of orbit.
If something on the spacecraft is not performing quite as expected, the return schedule can be moved up so that it will land in an empty swath of the Pacific Ocean.
That is what happened during Flight 14. Although SpaceX was not going to try to catch the Ship, it did plan to re-enter over the United States and then simulate a landing over the Gulf of Mexico. However, because one of the upper-stage engines had failed during ascent, SpaceX decided to be cautious and have the Ship return early, splashing down in the Pacific.
What comes after this test flight?
Flight 16 could be the first Starship launch from SpaceX’s revamped launchpad at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The launch site in Texas is not sufficient to serve SpaceX’s planned acceleration of Starship launches. Another Florida launchpad is under construction at the nearby Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, and SpaceX has announced plans to build a huge launch complex in Louisiana.
SpaceX could also hit a major milestone next year if it can launch two Starships in quick succession, dock them together in orbit and then move liquid methane and liquid oxygen propellants from one Starship to the other.
The refueling maneuver is essential for Starship to leave low-Earth orbit and head to more distant destinations like the moon and Mars. That is because by the time the upper-stage Ship reaches orbit, its tanks are almost empty.
SpaceX’s plan is to put up the equivalent of an orbital gas station. A series of tanker Starships will bring propellants to fill up the station. When it is full, the Starship that is headed to the moon or elsewhere beyond low-Earth orbit will launch, dock with the gas station, refuel and then continue on its journey.
Why is Starship important for NASA?
In the second half of 2027, NASA plans to undertake its Artemis III mission. That trip will not go to the moon but will remain in orbit around Earth to practice docking procedures. Like the Artemis II mission that flew to the moon and back this year, the Artemis III astronauts will sit inside an Orion spacecraft, launched atop of NASA’s Space Launch System rocket.
After they reach orbit, the astronauts will practice docking with prototype moon landers, first with the Blue Moon spacecraft built by Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin company and then with Starship.
NASA has not yet decided which lander it will use for Artemis IV, which will try to land two astronauts on the moon near its south pole.
Wasn’t Starship supposed to be heading to Mars already?
In March last year, Mr. Musk said on X that Starship would be heading to Mars by the end of 2026. The two planets line up to provide an optimal trajectory every 26 months.
On board would be Optimus humanoid robots built by Tesla, Mr. Musk’s car company.
But failures during Starship test flights last year meant that the craft would fall behind schedule. The Optimus robots have appeared in demos but do not appear to be ready for official space missions, either.
