By MARCIA DUNN
SpaceX launched its enormous Starship into orbit for the first time Monday, aiming for six full laps around Earth to prove its readiness for NASA’s Artemis moon program.
The spacecraft almost didn’t achieve the long-desired goal after one of its engines shut down too soon. But with everything else working well and the bad engine no longer needed, flight controllers decided after several tense minutes to proceed as planned.
“Starship is orbital,” Mission Control announced to cheers.
Founder Elon Musk’s showpiece rocket — the biggest and most powerful ever built — carried 26 of the latest and most advanced Starlink satellites to join the 11,000 older models already providing internet service. They popped out of the spacecraft one by one, drawing more cheers from the SpaceX crowds looking on from the launch site at Starbase, Texas.
It was Starship’s 14th full-scale launch from Texas’ southern tip in three years. The earlier test flights ventured no farther than the Indian Ocean halfway around the world, often crashing in flames and briefly skimming space.
This time, SpaceX was intent on circling the globe from an altitude of 170 miles (275 kilometers) — not just once but six times over almost 10 hours, ending with a Pacific splashdown near Chile.
The first-stage booster wasn’t meant to return to the Starbase launch site either, instead dropping into the Gulf of Mexico within minutes of the morning liftoff.
SpaceX launched its enormous Starship into orbit for the first time Monday, aiming for six full laps around Earth to prove its readiness for NASA’s Artemis moon program.
The spacecraft almost didn’t achieve the long-desired goal after one of its engines shut down too soon. But with everything else working well and the bad engine no longer needed, flight controllers decided after several tense minutes to proceed as planned.
“Starship is orbital,” Mission Control announced to cheers.
Founder Elon Musk’s showpiece rocket — the biggest and most powerful ever built — carried 26 of the latest and most advanced Starlink satellites to join the 11,000 older models already providing internet service. They popped out of the spacecraft one by one, drawing more cheers from the SpaceX crowds looking on from the launch site at Starbase, Texas.
It was Starship’s 14th full-scale launch from Texas’ southern tip in three years. The earlier test flights ventured no farther than the Indian Ocean halfway around the world, often crashing in flames and briefly skimming space.
This time, SpaceX was intent on circling the globe from an altitude of 170 miles (275 kilometers) — not just once but six times over almost 10 hours, ending with a Pacific splashdown near Chile.