On Thursday, March 14th, SpaceX carried out a test launch of its Starship rocket system from the company’s facility in Boca Chica, Texas. This was the third major test flight for the Starship vehicle.
The rocket reportedly took off at around 9:25 am Eastern Time. About three minutes after liftoff, the first stage booster called Super Heavy separated from the upper Starship spacecraft segment as planned.
One of the main goals was for the Starship spacecraft to reach orbit, which it successfully did. The spacecraft then reentered the atmosphere around 40 minutes later. However, SpaceX reported that it did not make it to the intended splashdown area in the Indian Ocean.
During the flight, SpaceX aimed to test
“a number of ambitious objectives, including the successful ascent burn of both stages, opening and closing Starship’s payload door, a propellant transfer demonstration during the upper stage’s coast phase, the first ever re-light of a Raptor engine while in space, and a controlled reentry of Starship.”
More analysis is needed to determine if those objectives were met.
The Super Heavy booster also impacted the Gulf of Mexico after not being able to reignite its engines for a controlled landing as intended. But overall, the company considered the test flight a success in demonstrating Starship’s atmospheric re-entry despite losing the vehicle.
Starship is being developed by SpaceX to eventually carry cargo and crew on missions to the Moon and Mars. NASA has contracted the recently tested spacecraft to transport astronauts to the lunar surface for the Artemis III mission currently planned for 2026.
This test is built upon previous high-altitude flight tests in 2021 and 2022, which provided data for design improvements over time. More test launches are still expected as SpaceX progresses towards making Starship a fully reusable transportation system for deep space exploration.