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On its third try, SpaceX launched a Starship-Super Heavy rocket from Boca Chica Beach, Texas, at 7:30 p.m. EDT/6:30 p.m. local time Aug. 26.
A SpaceX Starship-Super Heavy rocket lifted off from the southern tip of Texas Aug. 26, kicking off the 10th in an ongoing series of flight tests to mature technologies for the company’s planned reusable, refuelable and high-tempo space transport.
After back-to-back launch scrubs due to a ground system leak and then poor weather, the rocket’s first stage, powered by 33 methane-fed Raptor 2 engines, ignited at 7:30 p.m. EDT/6:30 p.m. local time from the newly incorporated Gulf-coast city of Starbase, Texas.
Generating some 16.5 million lb. of thrust—more than twice the power of NASA’s Space Launch System or the Apollo-era Saturn V rocket—the 404-ft tall Starship-Super Heavy headed toward a suborbital trajectory for a planned 66-min. flight demonstration. One engine shut down during ascent, with no discernible impact on the mission.
Two min. 26 min. after liftoff, all but three of the Super Heavy engines shut down, while the six Raptors on the Starship upper stage ignited to push the ship off the booster, a technique known as hot-staging.
As Starship headed to its intended suborbital trajectory, the Super Heavy completed a controlled flip then fired up 12 of 13-planned engines for a boostback burn toward the launch site. The flip maneuver, demonstrated for the first time on Flight 9 in May, requires less propellant to be held in reserve, allowing more lift capacity for payloads.
Three previous Super Heavy rockets returned to the launchpad for a mid-air capture by a pair of tower arms. But SpaceX passed on the gantry landing for Flight 10 so that it could test the booster’s performance during an intentional off-nominal landing burn.
With just two of its usual three center engines firing, the Super Heavy hovered for a few seconds over the ocean and then dropped into the Gulf of Mexico, which the Trump administration calls the Gulf of America, bringing its part of Flight 10 to an end.
Starship meanwhile completed a six-min, 19-sec. burn of its six Raptor engines and began an hour-long coast that ended with a controlled splashdown in the Indian Ocean. The primary object of Flight 10 was to collect data during reentry that will enable future Starships to return to the launch site.
Prior to the reentry tests, Starship demonstrated a payload-dispenser system that is designed to deploy SpaceX’s large, next-generation Starlink satellites. About 18.5 min. after launch, Starship’s payload bay door slot opened and the first of eight Starlink dummy satellites were released into suborbital space.
SpaceX plans to launch batches of 60 Starlink version 3 satellites on each Starship mission, which each flight adding 20 times the capacity of what a single Falcon 9 can deliver, SpaceX launch commentators noted.
After the dummy satellites were deployed, Starship moved on to another demonstration, momentarily relighting one of its Raptor engines. The data is expected to pave the way for future orbital Starship missions that require deorbit burns.
Starship’s launch was timed so that it would make a daylight descent and splashdown in the Indian Ocean. Several tiles on the ship’s heat shield were removed to stress-test vulnerable areas across the vehicle during reentry. SpaceX also added multiple metallic tiles, including one with active cooling, to test alternative heat shield materials.
The ship also is outfitted with fittings for future tower captures so SpaceX could collect thermal and structural performance data of the hardware.
Starship’s reentry profile was designed to stress the structural limits of the ship’s rear flaps, which sustained damage during reentry but remained operational.
Starship then lit its three center engines to conduct a landing burn and hovered over the ocean before falling over and breaking apart, bringing Flight 10 to a close.
The demonstration was SpaceX’s first full-duration Starship flight test since Flight 6 on Nov. 19, 2024, though not for lack of trying.
After successful separation from Super Heavy boosters, Starship upper stages for Flights 7, 8 and 9, which took place on Jan. 16, March 6 and May 27, 2025, respectively, were prematurely lost, though all for different reasons.
Flight 7 ended about 8.5 min. after launch due to fires in the Starship engine aft section triggered by propellant leaks from unexpected vibrations.
Flight 8 lasted 9 min. 30 sec. due to an unrelated engine hardware failure that inadvertently caused propellants to mix and ignite. That set off a series of engine shutdowns and loss of the vehicle.
Flight 9 reached its intended near-orbital trajectory, but fuel leaks caused the ship to lose attitude control and it began spinning. The ship reentered the atmosphere in the wrong orientation and was destroyed during reentry.
SpaceX planned to return to flight a month later, but on June 18, the Starship being prepared to fly exploded on a test stand during fueling for a routine prelaunch static fire. The accident destroyed the vehicle and damaged the test stand and surrounding area.
Engineers determined the most probable cause was undetected damage to a composite overwrapped pressure vessel (COPV) in Starship’s payload bay section. The failure of the COPV, which holds gaseous nitrogen for Starship’s environmental control system, led to a structural failure that allowed propellants to mix and ignite.
SpaceX implemented several changes, including operating the COPVs at a reduced pressure. The company said it also added inspections and proof tests, updated its COPV acceptance criteria and developed a new non-destructive evaluation method to detect internal COPV damage.
Starship-Super Heavy flight tests began in April 2023. SpaceX is developing the fully reusable system, which can carry 110-165 tons into low Earth orbit, for a program to colonize Mars.
NASA is buying a version of the Starship to ferry astronauts to and from lunar orbit and the Moon’s surface under contracts worth about $4 billion.
To reach the Moon, SpaceX will need to first launch 12-15 precursor Starship tanker missions to low Earth orbit with propellant for the Starship Human Landing System (HLS) mission.
NASA is targeting its first Moon landing in the Artemis program to take place in 2027. SpaceX plans to begin orbital refueling demonstrations next year.
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