SpaceX is preparing to launch the most powerful rocket ever built as Elon Musk targets missions to the Moon and Mars.
The billionaire’s company is poised to conduct the 12th uncrewed test flight of its next-generation Starship rocket, the first of a newly upgraded vehicle seen as critical to pushing deeper into space.
Today’s launch comes just two years ahead of a planned mission to use the vehicle to carry astronauts to the Moon. A live stream of the launch will be available on the Mirror website.
New UpdatesToday15:53 BST
SpaceX’s Starship, which it is launching later today, may be the type that NASA uses to land astronauts back on the Moon.
The test is the 12th Starship flight but the first launch of the new third-generation, dubbed V3, which is bigger, more powerful and a step closer to being fully reusable.
Tim HanlonToday15:26 BST
A live stream of the launch will be shown on the Mirror website and SpaceX’s website, as well as the company’s official X page and YouTube channel.
It will start broadcasting the event about 45 minutes before lift-off, which is currently scheduled for 5:30pm local time (11:30pm BST) today.
The SpaceX Super Heavy Booster and Starship spacecraft stand on Orbital Launch Pad 2 at Starbase(Image: Joe Marino/UPI/Shutterstock)
Starship is to launch close to SpaceX’s IPO which means there will be more eyes than ever on it – including prospective investors.
The prospectus did not put a dollar figure on the amount Elon Musk hopes to raise from shares, but various reports have put it at $75 billion or so.
SpaceX plans for Starship to play a central role in the future of its space-based internet business, Starlink, as well as offering services to NASA and the US military which means there’s a lot riding on its success.
Tim Hanlon
Today14:32 BST
SpaceX 11th test flight was last October was a success where it thundered into the evening sky from the southern tip of Texas.
The booster peeled away and made a controlled entry into the Gulf of Mexico as planned, with the spacecraft skimming space before descending into the Indian Ocean. Nothing was recovered.
“Hey, welcome back to Earth, Starship,” SpaceX’s Dan Huot announced as employees cheered. “What a day.”
It was the latest test flight for a full-scale Starship ahead of today’s, which SpaceX founder and CEO Elon Musk intends to use to send people to Mars.
SpaceX is planning a mission to Mars(Image: AFP via Getty Images)
Elon Musk said a year ago that he foresaw Starship making its first uncrewed voyage to Mars at the end of 2026.
A successful test flight would help reinforce SpaceX’s case that Starship, the world’s largest and most powerful rocket ever flown, is nearing commercial readiness after years of explosive setbacks and development delays.
Multiple Starship tankers would be needed to fill one Starship with enough fuel for a moon landing under SpaceX’s proposed moonshot plan.
That is part of a $3 billion-plus contract SpaceX won in 2021 under NASA’s Artemis programme, the US effort to return astronauts to the surface of themoon later this decade for the first time since 1972 at the end of the Apollo era. Those plans put Starship at the center of a new space race with China, which aims for a crewed lunar landing of its own in 2030.
Tim HanlonToday13:20 BST
SpaceX says it has a 90 minute window open for the launch with weather at the moment favourable.
It wrote on X: “The 90-minute test window opens at 5:30 p.m. CT (11.30pm BST) with live coverage starting ~45 minutes before liftoff. Weather is currently 55% favourable for liftoff.”
Tim Hanlon
Today12:55 BST
The Super Heavy is expected to come down in the Gulf of Mexico about seven minutes after blastoff, with Starship’s “exciting landing,” as SpaceX refers to it, is anticipated about an hour later in the Indian Ocean.
Before that landing, plans call for Starship’s payload to release a clutch of 20 Starlink simulators, plus two actual satellites modified to scan the spacecraft’s heat shield and transmit data to operators on the ground during re-entry.
The Super Heavy rocket booster will vault the ship toward space before breaking away. Both booster and spacecraft will be on suborbital trajectories before attempting to make controlled landings in the ocean.
Tim HanlonToday12:28 BST
One of the principal upgrades to the booster rocket is a revamping of its 33 Raptor engines to produce greater thrust from a design that weighs significantly less.
The propulsion system of the upper-stage Starship has similarly been refined for long-duration missions, with mechanisms to allow for ship-to-ship docking, refueling in space and increased maneuverability.
A key measure of success for future test outings will be post-flight recovery of Starship and the Super Heavy booster, which are being developed as reusable vehicles.
SpaceX said it would not attempt to safely land or retrieve either portion of the spacecraft from this launch. But test objectives include execution of several return-flight maneuvers by the booster and Starship itself, including controlled landing burns before each vehicle splashes down at sea.
The new design is set to mean greater thrust(Image: ZUMAPRESS.com / Zuma Press / Avalon)
Elon Musk is preparing for the launch after announcing one of the biggest stock sales ever by making SpaceX public
A filing shows that his SpaceX lost $2.6 billion from operations last year on $18.7 billion in revenue, and the losses kept piling up at the start of this year, too.
The prospectus did not put a figure on the amount Musk hopes to raise, but various reports have put it at $75 billion or so. An offering of that size would easily surpass the current title holder, Saudi Aramco, the oil giant that went public seven years ago and raised $26 billion.
SpaceX, formally known as Space Exploration Technologies Corp., has said the money will help finance projects to put people on the moon and Mars in its quest to make humans an intergalactic species as they face existential threats that could wipe out civilization.
Tim Hanlon
Today12:28 BST
A fully reusable rocket ship is crucial to Elon Musk’s goals of dramatically cutting launch costs, expanding his Starlink satellite business and pursuing ambitions ranging from orbital data centers to human interplanetary missions.
The towering spacecraft, consisting of the upper-stage Starship astronaut vessel stacked atop its Super Heavy booster rocket, was due for launch as early as Thursday, the company said.
It was targeting a liftoff from its Starbase facilities in Texas on the Gulf of Mexico.
The Starship spacecraft stand on Orbital Launch Pad 2 at Starbase(Image: Joe Marino/UPI/Shutterstock)
When fully stacked, the Starship craft and Super Heavy booster measure just over 124m and weigh roughly 5,000 metric tonnes, making it larger than Big Ben’s Elizabeth Tower.
The debut flight of the Starship V3 is outfitted with new features designed to support future missions to the moon and Mars.
Tim HanlonToday12:28 BST
A live stream of the launch will be shown on the Mirror website and SpaceX’s website, as well as the company’s official X page and YouTube channel.
It will start broadcasting the event about 45 minutes before lift-off, which is currently scheduled for 5:30pm local time (11:30pm BST) today.