SpaceX’s giant 400 ft tall Starship will make a sixth test flight on November 19th, subject to the usual weather and last-minute technical checks. The fifth flight saw the ‘super heavy’ booster stage captured by a pair of ‘chopsticks’ upon its return to Earth at Elon Musk’s Starbase.
The next Starship flight test aims to expand the envelope on ship and booster capabilities and get closer to bringing reuse of the entire system. Objectives include the booster once again returning to the launch site for catch, reigniting a ship Raptor engine while in space, and testing a suite of heatshield experiments and maneuvring changes for ship re-entry and descent over the Indian Ocean.
SpaceX said, “The success of the first catch attempt demonstrated the design feasibility while providing valuable data to continue improving hardware and software performance. Hardware upgrades for this [sixth] flight add additional redundancy to booster propulsion systems, increase structural strength at key areas, and shorten the timeline to offload propellants from the booster following a successful catch. Mission designers also updated software controls and commit criteria for the booster’s launch and return.”
Starship’s upper stage will fly the same suborbital trajectory as the previous fifth flight test, with splashdown targeted in the Indian Ocean. An additional objective for this flight will be attempting an in-space burn using a single Raptor engine, further demonstrating the capabilities required to conduct a ship deorbit burn prior to orbital missions.
Future ships, starting with the vehicle planned for seventh flight test, will fly with significant upgrades including redesigned forward flaps, larger propellant tanks, and the latest generation tiles and secondary thermal protection layers as they continue to iterate towards a fully reusable heat shield. Learnings from this and subsequent flight tests will continue to make the entire Starship system more reliable as it closes in on full reusability.
Kathy Lueders, General Manager of SpaceX’s Starbase, announced that SpaceX wants to fully recover a Starship sometime in the next six months and have 25 launches in 2025.