On Tuesday, May 27, SpaceX launched Starship—“the largest and most powerful rocket ever built”—from its Starbase site in Texas. As reported in The New York Times, the mission aimed to test a new system for future space exploration, but the flight ended prematurely when a propellant leak caused the spacecraft to spin out of control and break apart during re-entry.
According to CBC News, this was the “ninth demo from Starbase,” and despite the failure to survive re-entry, it marked progress. The rocket’s upper-stage vehicle performed better than in its previous attempts in January and March, both of which ended in explosion before reaching orbit. SpaceX CEO, Elon Musk posted on X that it was a “big improvement.”
Although this flight did not achieve all its goals, it wasn’t a total loss. Engineers confirmed that issues during ascent, which doomed the seventh and eighth flights, were resolved. According to The Times, this time, the Starship completed the engine cutoff and showed “no significant loss of heat shield tiles during ascent.”
The super heavy booster used in the flight had already been flown once before, making this an important step toward the long-term goal of reusability. However, during its descent over the Gulf of Mexico, it failed a simulated landing maneuver and was destroyed when one of its engines shut down. SpaceX noted that it was “attempting various tests to push the performance of the booster,” so the outcome was not a major setback.
Before Launch, Musk emphasized the importance of testing the vehicle’s heat shield, saying, “it’s all about the tiles.” The spacecraft was equipped with a variety of tile designs to see which ones offered the best protection. According to the The Times, due to the uncontrolled spin, “that data was not collected, and the test will have to be attempted again on the next flight.”
Several other planned tests were also missed. These included opening a payload door to release simulated Starlin satellites. Deccan Herald wrote that “the payload door failed to open” before the spacecraft started rotating in circles.
The Times reported that SpaceX is known for its “fail and fix quickly” approach to development, and Starship is no exception. None of its test flights have gone perfectly, but the company counts on iterating quickly. Musk posted after the flight that “the next three Starship test flights would occur at a faster pace, one every three to four weeks,” though he often sets “unrealistic schedules.”
Starships play a major role in SpaceX’s long-term vision of space exploration. It has been selected by NASA to land astronauts on the Moon as part of the Artemis III mission, but Musk has expressed little excitement about the lunar project. In an interview, he described Artemis’s goal as “objectively feeble,” adding, “We should either do a base on the moon, or we should send people to Mars.”
“SpaceX plans to launch about five uncrewed Starships to Mars in two years,” Musk posted on X. “If those all land safely, then crewed missions are possible in four years. If we encounter challenges, then the crewed missions will be postponed another two years.”
