South Padre Island (United States) (AFP) – SpaceX on Thursday scrubbed what was to be its first Starship flight since the company went public, abruptly calling it off just as the booster began to ignite. “Some of the engines didn’t start, triggering an automatic launch abort. Now offloading propellant. Next launch attempt hopefully in a few days,” wrote company head Elon Musk on X.
It was to be the mammoth rocket’s 13th flight overall. When it eventually takes off, the flight’s aims will be similar to those of a mostly successful voyage carried out in May, which debuted the latest edition of the powerful Starship, its third-generation model. The goals of that test were essentially to demonstrate the new designs in flight. It was not without a few glitches, however, including engine issues with the Super Heavy booster that necessitated a crash into the Gulf of Mexico rather than a precision return.
The company said “there have been several modifications to hardware and software to address issues seen on the previous flight.” SpaceX will aspire the next time around to execute a launch, ascent, stage separation, boostback burn, and landing burn of the booster offshore without hiccups. The upper stage will deploy 20 Starlink V3 satellites, and SpaceX said it will test out a relight of a Raptor engine in space. It will also test upgrades to Starship’s heat shield.
The latest flight will be the first after Musk’s SpaceX went public on Wall Street in June, with a record initial public offering. The rocket company has rapidly expanded its satellite internet service and voiced lofty ambitions for AI data centers in space. There’s a lot riding on SpaceX’s progress: the company is under contract with NASA to produce a modified version of Starship to serve as a lunar landing system.
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