Elon Musk’s Starship Megarocket Launches Successfully On Tenth Trial Flight

SpaceX successfully launched its Starship megarocket on its tenth test flight on Tuesday (26 August), overcoming previous setbacks that had raised questions about Elon Musk’s long-term goal of establishing human presence on Mars, AFP reported.

The 403-foot (123-meter) rocket, the largest and most powerful ever constructed, blasted off from SpaceX’s Starbase facility in southern Texas at 6.30 pm local time, drawing applause from the company’s engineers.

The Starship project is central to Musk’s aim of transforming humanity into a multiplanetary species.

NASA is also counting on a specialised version of the rocket to serve as its lunar lander for upcoming Moon missions.

Earlier launch attempt on Sunday was postponed due to a fuel leak on the launchpad, while unfavorable weather conditions, including heavy cloud cover, caused a further delay on Monday.

The test carried added significance since the previous three Starship flights ended in explosions of the upper stage—two over the Caribbean and one after reaching orbit.

Additionally, a ground test in June saw another upper stage destroyed.

For this flight, SpaceX aimed to send the Starship upper stage, designed for future crew and cargo missions, on a trajectory spanning half the globe before it splashed down near northwestern Australia.

The test vehicle was equipped with experimental heat-shield materials and carried mock Starlink satellites. Its flight path was specifically designed to evaluate the performance of its rear flaps under stress.

Unlike earlier demonstrations where the booster was caught in the launch tower’s “chopstick arms,” this mission prioritised gathering data on performance during unexpected engine shutdowns.

Despite recent setbacks, Starship is not seen as being at a crisis point.

SpaceX’s rapid-test approach has already positioned it as a leader in commercial spaceflight, with Falcon rockets dominating launches, Dragon capsules serving the ISS, and Starlink emerging as a vital communications tool.

Nonetheless, Starship faces unique hurdles. Musk has acknowledged that creating a fully reusable orbital heat shield is the most difficult challenge, pointing out that NASA’s Space Shuttle once required nine months of work to refurbish its heat shield between flights.

"What we're trying to achieve here with Starship is to have a heat shield that can be flown immediately," he said on a webcast Monday.

A further challenge involves demonstrating orbital refueling with super-cooled propellants, a critical but untested capability required for Starship to undertake long-range missions into deep space.

Time is running short to ready a modified version as NASA's lunar lander for 2027.

Meanwhile, Musk has pledged to launch an uncrewed Starship mission to Mars as early as next year.

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