What's on the Horizon for Elon Musk's SpaceX Starship Rocket?

11.10.2024

Elon Musk aims to revolutionize spaceflight with his new rocket, Starship, which is now the largest and most powerful spacecraft ever built. Designed to be fully reusable, SpaceX, the company behind the rocket, hopes to create a spaceship that functions more like an airplane than a traditional rocket, landing, refueling, and taking off again in a matter of hours.

The exact date for Starship’s next launch hasn’t been set, but it could be as soon as this weekend. This upcoming test flight will be Starship’s fifth, and the main focus will be on the landing phase, specifically the return of the Super Heavy booster, the bottom part of the vehicle. Previous tests have only achieved a splashdown at sea, but SpaceX hopes this time to return the booster to the launch pad. Musk has expressed plans to attempt catching the booster mid-air using the launch tower’s giant mechanical arms, nicknamed “Mechazilla,” a feat never accomplished before.

While none of Starship’s missions have been crewed so far, the long-term vision is for the rocket system to eventually take humans to Mars. Though a Mars trip isn’t on the immediate horizon, Starship already has impressive capabilities. It’s the most powerful rocket ever built, with 33 engines generating thrust nearly 700 times that of a commercial passenger plane. The vehicle stands over 120 meters tall, making it about twice as powerful as the Saturn V rocket that took humans to the Moon.

Starship is a two-stage vehicle, with the upper part known as the “Ship” sitting atop the Super Heavy booster. Both components are powered by liquid methane and liquid oxygen, a fuel mix called methalox. Starship’s goal is to eventually catch both the Ship and the booster using the launch tower, though for the next test, only the booster will be caught this way. The Ship, on the other hand, will use a “belly-flop” maneuver to land, where it reorients itself from a horizontal to a vertical position by firing its engines before landing.

Starship has a range of potential applications. Musk’s current rockets, such as the Falcon 9 series, are used to launch Starlink satellites, and Starship could be used for similar missions. NASA also plans to use Starship for its Artemis program, with a lunar mission scheduled for 2026. In the distant future, Starship could be used for trips to Mars, possibly carrying up to 100 passengers. Its massive payload capacity also makes it suitable for launching larger space telescopes or carrying the heavy equipment needed to build infrastructure for a human presence on the Moon.