Mere moments after SpaceX\u2019s Starship system \u2014 the most powerful rocket ever built \u2014 was lost in a test flight Saturday, a somewhat complicated narrative around the vehicle began to emerge. <\/p>\n
The company immediately described the flight as a huge step in the right direction. <\/p>\n
\u201cWhat we did today will provide invaluable data to continue rapidly developing Starship,\u201d SpaceX said Saturday in a statement. \u201cWith a test like this, success comes from what we learn, and today\u2019s test will help us improve Starship\u2019s reliability as SpaceX seeks to make life multiplanetary.\u201d <\/p>\n
Yet the loss of another Super Heavy rocket booster and Starship spacecraft highlights just how far they have left to go in the development process, even as significant progress is made. It also raises questions about whether SpaceX can meet some key deadlines on the horizon. <\/p>\n
Enabling humans to colonize the cosmos is the ultimate goal for this vehicle: SpaceX intends to use it to send people to the moon, Mars and beyond. <\/p>\n
Crucially, the Starship spacecraft is also the vehicle that NASA selected to land US astronauts on the moon for the first time in five decades as part of its Artemis program. The space agency is racing against China to get the job done, vying to become the first to develop a permanent lunar outpost and set the precedent for deep-space settlements. <\/p>\n
The first lunar mission that would make use of Starship \u2014 Artemis III \u2014 is slated for late 2025. In the aftermath of the first failed test flight in April, NASA officials expressed concern that the vehicle wouldn\u2019t be ready in time. <\/p>\n
But federal officials reacted favorably to Saturday\u2019s test launch. NASA Administrator Bill Nelson offered SpaceX his congratulations and noted \u201ctest is an opportunity to learn \u2014 then fly again.\u201d <\/p>\n
And to be clear, Starship is still an essential part of NASA\u2019s moon-landing plan. However, there are numerous daunting technological hurdles left to clear before those lunar ambitions becomes reality. <\/p>\n
Several key aspects of the second flight test went to plan: When the rocket took off from the SpaceX Starbase launch site in Boca Chica, Texas, just after 8 a.m. ET, it was able to ignite all 33 of its engines and continue firing them as the Super Heavy booster \u2014 which gives the initial burst of power at liftoff \u2014 burned through most of its fuel. <\/p>\n
The Starship spacecraft was then able to ignite its own engines and break away from the Super Heavy rocket booster to continue the mission. And the launchpad that served as the starting point managed to survive the sheer force of a rocket generating up to 16.7 million pounds of thrust (7,590 tonnes of force). <\/p>\n
None of those milestones were met during the vehicle\u2019s inaugural integrated test flight in April. <\/p>\n
But other important steps originally slated for Saturday\u2019s mission didn\u2019t happen. The Super Heavy booster experienced a \u201crapid unscheduled disassembly\u201d \u2014 or an unintentional explosion \u2014\u00a0shortly after Starship separated from it. The mishap prevented SpaceX from testing the maneuvers that will be necessary to land and reuse the launch vehicle. <\/p>\n
Similarly, the Starship capsule made it roughly 10 minutes into its flight, reaching an altitude considered to be beyond the edge of space \u2014 about 93 miles (150 kilometers) above Earth\u2019s surface \u2014 but SpaceX was forced to terminate the mission when ground control lost its signal. <\/p>\n
The vehicle did not spend as much time in space as the company had hoped, collecting mere moments of flight data rather than the hour-and-a-half\u2019s worth mapped out for the mission. John Insprucker, principal integration engineer at SpaceX, said during the livestream that the company had to trigger Starship\u2019s self-destruct feature after contact with the vehicle was lost. <\/p>\n
That meant SpaceX wasn\u2019t able to test out Starship\u2019s landing technique either. <\/p>\n
\u201cThe hardest part about this \u2014 or the part that will take the longest \u2014 is solving for safe (Starship) reentry and landing,\u201d SpaceX CEO Elon Musk acknowledged in October during the International Astronautical Congress in Baku, Azerbaijian. <\/p>\n
Being able to recover and rapidly reuse both the Starship spacecraft and the Super Heavy booster are essential to SpaceX\u2019s long-term goals. Such capabilities would make the rocket system affordable and nimble enough to rapidly conduct all the launches necessary to get the vehicle to the moon. <\/p>\n
In order to reach lunar orbit, Starship must be refueled while it\u2019s parked near Earth. That\u2019s because the massive spacecraft <\/strong>won\u2019t have enough propellant left over to traverse the 238,900-mile (384,472-kilometer) void between our home planet and the moon after the initial launch process. <\/p>\n As of now, SpaceX acknowledges it has to launch more than a dozen Starship tankers to refuel one spacecraft destined for the moon,\u00a0said Wayne Hale \u2014 the chair of the NASA Advisory Council\u2019s Human Exploration and Operations Committee \u2014 in a Saturday interview. That\u2019s because of the Starship\u2019s immense size: Just getting the vehicle into space requires it to burn through the majority of its fuel. And while Starship can hold up to 3 million (1,500 metric tons) of propellant, the spacecraft itself is only capable of hauling up to 55,000 pounds (250 metric tons) of extra cargo to orbit, according to data published by SpaceX and the FAA. <\/p>\n With many milestones left to hit, it\u2019s clear that even if the next Starship test flight is wholly successful, a moon landing will remain on the distant horizon. <\/p>\n Musk previously acknowledged\u00a0in 2020 that he hopes SpaceX will launch \u201chundreds of missions\u201d with satellites before attempting a flight with crew. SpaceX also must build and test the versions of Starship that will serve as refueling tankers. A lander must be outfitted with life support equipment. And NASA will require Starship to make an uncrewed test landing on the moon before allowing its astronauts on board. <\/p>\n Still, SpaceX emphasized that explosive failures can be integral to its development process, which embraces fiery mishaps in the early stages of designing a rocket in order to learn how to build a better rocket faster than if the company solely relied on ground tests. <\/p>\n Though SpaceX\u2019s failed test flights garner plenty of critics, it does not mean that the company is moving more slowly or costing more money than if NASA had attempted to develop a lunar lander itself. <\/p>\n All told, NASA will pay SpaceX about\u00a0$4 billion for two lunar landings. (The company has already invested more than $3 billion in developing its South Texas launch facility and the Starship Super Heavy launch system since 2014, according to an FAA court filing dated May 19.) <\/p>\n For comparison, the Space Launch System rocket and Orion spacecraft that NASA developed for the Artemis program have together cost more than $44 billion since 2006, according to data aggregated by the nonprofit Planetary Society. That rocket system had its first flight test last year. Under NASA\u2019s current plans, SLS and Orion would transport astronauts from Earth to lunar orbit, while Starship would complete the final leg of the journey, ferrying them from the Orion spacecraft to the moon\u2019s surface. <\/p>\n But Hale noted that SpaceX doesn\u2019t use the same development approach as NASA. The space agency spends years on careful design and rigorous ground testing \u2014 all but guaranteeing success on the first flight. In contrast, SpaceX wants to put early prototypes in the air, accepting that they may explode but will likely provide valuable information for future testing. <\/p>\n \u201cThis is a different paradigm,\u201d Hale said of Starship development. \u201cThe government \u2014 when you\u2019re working with the taxpayers\u2019 <\/strong>dollars \u2014 you really want to be careful and make sure you succeed. <\/p>\n \u201cWhereas (SpaceX) is a private company,\u201d Hale added. \u201cYes, they\u2019re doing this work in support of the government, but their methodology is quite different. And I think you could be successful either way. But, this way certainly has its exciting moments.\u201d <\/p>\n Starship can also be compared with Blue Moon, another lunar lander under development by the Jeff Bezos-owned space company Blue Origin. NASA selected Blue Moon as an alternative lunar lander for future Artemis missions. <\/p>\n NASA expects to pay the company $3.4 billion for a single crewed lunar landing \u2014 the Artemis V mission currently slated for 2028 \u2014 with Blue Origin investing at least that much of its own money. <\/p>\n Lakiesha Hawkins, the deputy to the deputy associate administrator for NASA\u2019s moon to Mars program, said at its advisory council\u2019s Human Exploration and Operations Committee meeting last week that Blue Origin\u2019s lunar lander won\u2019t necessarily be simpler than SpaceX\u2019s behemoth rocket and spacecraft system. <\/p>\n \u201cBoth of those providers have their challenges,\u201d Hawkins said, referring to SpaceX\u2019s Starship and Blue Origin\u2019s Blue Moon lunar lander. \u201cAnd they are equally \u2014 from my perspective\u00a0\u2014 complex.\u201d <\/p>\n Blue Origin declined to comment on where Blue Moon stands in the development process. <\/p>\n The companies are taking very different approaches in their moon landing strategies, but experts say both SpaceX and Blue Origin will be distinct from their predecessor in some key ways. <\/p>\n Hale, the committee chair, said it can be difficult for members of the public to wrap their heads around why all of these projects are costing so much development time and money if NASA already knows how to put humans on the moon. <\/p>\n Why not just repeat the same thing NASA did during the Apollo program? <\/p>\n \u201cPeople ask what was wrong with Apollo,\u201d Hale said during the committee meeting last week. \u201cThe thing that was wrong with Apollo was it ended.\u201d <\/p>\n NASA and SpaceX are aiming to develop vehicles that don\u2019t just go to the moon once. Apollo already accomplished the \u201cflags and footprints\u201d missions, Hale noted. <\/p>\n Now, the space agency is looking to develop rockets and spacecraft that can push exploration further. NASA aims to establish a permanent moon base and eventually reach Mars in a cost-effective manner. <\/p>\n \u201cWhen you put those sustainable reusability requirements on the program \u2014 and the fact that it\u2019s leading on to go to Mars \u2014 you do buy into perhaps a more complicated architecture than just repeating Apollo,\u201d Hale said. <\/p>\n And, even as he acknowledged Starship has a long way to go, he added, \u201cI think they made a big step forward.\u201d <\/p>\n Musk has already said the Super Heavy booster and Starship spacecraft will likely be ready for a third test flight in \u201c3 to 4 weeks,\u201d according to a Sunday post on social media, adding, \u201cThere are three ships in final production.\u201d <\/p>\n It\u2019s not clear, however, how long it will take SpaceX engineers to review the data gathered during Saturday\u2019s flight and implement the necessary changes. And Musk is known\u00a0to publicize unmet deadlines. <\/p>\n Also unclear is whether SpaceX will have the necessary regulatory approvals to launch another test flight in just a few weeks. The Federal Aviation Administration, which licenses commercial rocket launches, indicated its intentions to open a standard <\/strong>mishap investigation into Saturday\u2019s test flight. After the first test flight in April, a similar investigation took over four months to complete. <\/p>\n Once the investigation is closed, the federal agency will then likely need to complete a safety review of SpaceX\u2019s plans for a third launch before it will issue another permit. It\u2019s not clear how long that process might take. <\/p>\n The FAA did not respond to a request for comment. <\/p>\n\n Mere moments after SpaceX\u2019s Starship system \u2014 the most powerful rocket ever built \u2014 was lost in a test flight Saturday, a somewhat complicated narrative around the vehicle began to emerge. The company immediately described the flight as a huge step in the right direction. \u201cWhat we did today will provide invaluable data to continue <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":11942,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-11941","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11941","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11941"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11941\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11942"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11941"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11941"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/shareperformanceinsight.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11941"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}} Starship and the Artemis timeline<\/h3>\n
Another lunar lander: Starship vs. Blue Moon<\/h3>\n
Why NASA isn\u2019t just repeating Apollo<\/h3>\n
What\u2019s next for Starship<\/h3>\n