SpaceX has launched its biggest, most powerful Starship yet on a test flight, an upgraded version that NASA is counting on to land astronauts on the moon.
The redesigned mega rocket made its debut two days after SpaceX chief Elon Musk announced he’s taking the company public.
It blasted off from the southern tip of Texas, carrying 20 mock Starlink satellites for release halfway around the world.
It’s the 12th test flight of the rocket that Musk is building to get people to Mars one day. But first comes the moon and NASA’s Artemis program.
The last of the old space-skimming Starships lifted off in October. SpaceX’s third-generation Starship – a souped-up version dubbed V3 – soared from a brand-new launch pad at Starbase, near the Mexican border, on Friday afternoon, local time.
Last-minute pad issues thwarted Thursday evening’s launch attempt.
SpaceX was hoping to avoid the fireworks it experienced during back-to-back launches in 2025 when midair explosions rained wreckage down on the Atlantic. Earlier flights also ended in flames.
At 124 metres, the latest model eclipses the older Starship lines by more than a metre and packs more engine thrust.
The revamped booster sports fewer but bigger and stronger grid fins for steering it back to earth following liftoff, and a larger and more robust fuel transfer line to feed the 33 main engines.
The retro-looking, stainless steel spacecraft also has more of everything – more cameras and more navigation and computer power – as well as docking cones for future rendezvous and moon missions.
Starship is meant to be fully reusable, with giant mechanical arms at the launch pads to catch the returning rocket stages. But on this latest trial run, nothing was being recovered.
The Gulf of Mexico marked the end of the road for the redesigned first-stage booster, and the Indian Ocean for the spacecraft and its satellite demos.
NASA is paying SpaceX billions of dollars – and also Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin – to provide the lunar landers that will be used to land Artemis astronauts on the moon.
The two companies are scrambling to be first.
While Starship has reached the fringes of space on multiple flights lasting an hour at most, Bezos’ Blue Moon has yet to lift off, although a prototype is being readied for a moonshot later in 2026.
NASA is following April’s successful lunar flyaround by four astronauts with a docking trial run in orbit around earth planned for 2027.
For that Artemis III mission, astronauts will practice docking their Orion capsule with Starship, Blue Moon or both.
A moon landing by two astronauts – Artemis IV – could follow as soon as 2028 using either Starship or Blue Moon, whichever lander is safer and ready first.
It will be NASA’s first lunar landing with a crew since 1972’s Apollo 17. The goal this time is a moon base near the lunar south pole, staffed by astronauts as well as robots.
SpaceX is already taking reservations for private flights to the moon and Mars on Starship, though the timing is uncertain.