The sixth test of Starship’s most powerful rocket is expected to bring the Super Heavy booster stage back to Earth intact, test the load of the top stage and a series of material assessments.
The Starship rocket took off from the launch pad at SpaceX’s Starbase facility in Boca Chica, Texas at 4:00 p.m. on November 19 (local time) or 5:00 a.m. on November 20 (Hanoi time). The 33 Raptor engines on the Super Heavy booster stage fired, sending the rocket into space.
About 3 minutes after launch, the Super Heavy thruster stage and the Starship’s upper stage successfully separated. However, SpaceX decided not to use the launch tower and chopsticks to catch the return booster like in the 5th test. About 7 minutes after launch, the booster fired its engine to land on the water. However, Everyday Astronaut’s livestream video showed the booster toppling over and exploding in a fireball after landing in the ocean, according to Reuters.
The Starship’s thruster landed in the Gulf of Mexico and exploded. Video:NASASpaceflight
In the most recent flight on October 13, SpaceX successfully landed the Super Heavy booster, returning to the launch pad with a giant “chopstick”. The company intended to repeat this feat with the launcher’s “chopsticks” system, but flight data did not allow it, according to Space.
“We passed a commitment criterion,” SpaceX’s Dan Huot said during the live broadcast of the 6th flight. As a result, the Super Heavy was landed in the Gulf of Mexico about seven minutes after liftoff.
Anticipation for the sixth flight was high, partly because of the effort to catch the booster. President Donald Trump watched the test live with Elon Musk, CEO of SpaceX, but did not have the opportunity to witness the booster stage being retained in the launch tower’s chopstick arm – an engineering feat that took place in Tested last month.
In addition, during this test SpaceX also wants to test the upper stage of Starship – a 50-meter high spacecraft, called Starship or Ship, with payload. This was the first time a spacecraft carried a stuffed banana, which served as a zero-gravity indicator (it was not deployed into space). Additionally, Starship restarted one of its six Raptor engines about 38 minutes into the flight. The goal of the test was to test whether the Starship would continue flying on its engines while the rocket returned to Earth.
The Starship upper deck carries a stuffed banana with a stainless steel exterior decorated with a cartoon banana. Image: Space
This burn demonstrated that Starship can perform the necessary maneuvers to safely return to Earth during orbital missions. Starship is designed to be completely and rapidly reusable, just like the Super Heavy. SpaceX plans to catch it using a “chopsticks” system, and will likely test it on a test flight in the near future. Landing directly on the launch pad, rather than on a ship at sea or a designated landing pad, will allow for more rapid and efficient inspection, refurbishment and reuse, SpaceX said.
Flight 6 also tested modifications to the Ship’s heat shield, which protects the vehicle upon re-entry into Earth’s atmosphere.
“The test flight will evaluate new secondary heat protection materials and will have entire sections of the heat shield removed from either side of the craft at locations being studied for the required support hardware.” kept on future vehicles,” SpaceX wrote in the mission description. “The craft will also intentionally fly at a higher angle during the final stages of descent, intentionally pushing the limits of flap control to collect data on future landing configurations.”
SpaceX also changed the launch time for the sixth flight to daytime to better observe the Starship’s reentry and descent. The fifth flight (and all four before it) took off from Texas in the morning, and the Starship’s upper stage went down in darkness in the Indian Ocean.
Starship is a launch system that is gradually proving SpaceX CEO Elon Musk’s ambition to bring humans to Mars for the first time. This is the tallest (120 m) and most powerful rocket ever built, capable of generating nearly 8,000 tons of thrust when launched.
This is a launch system including the Super Heavy thruster stage and the Starship spacecraft above. The booster rocket is located on the first stage and the spacecraft carrying people and cargo is on the second stage. The rocket’s mission is to bring the Starship to a point in orbit, then the Starship will continue flying using its engines while the rocket returns to Earth. Both parts are reusable.
NASA chose the Starship to bring astronauts to the Moon in the Artemis program. When the Starship makes its journey to the Moon, it will have to stay in low-Earth orbit while SpaceX launches separate support vehicles to refuel the ship. The mission to carry astronauts to the Moon will take place as early as 2026.