With President-elect Donald Trump in attendance Tuesday(Nov. 19) at the company's Starbase site in Boca Chica, South Texas, Elon Musk's SpaceX launched its 122-meter-tall Starship at 2200 UTC, on the megarocket's sixth test flight mission to space.
Following stage separation, the megarocket's first stage or Super Heavy(Booster 13) returned to earth about 7 minutes after liftoff, landing into the Gulf of Mexico. Unlike during flight 5 when booster 12 was caught by the mechanical 'chopstick' arm back at the launch tower, Tuesday's flight's data didn't support an attempt to catch booster 13, so it instead came in for a controlled splashdown. "We tripped a commit criteria," SpaceX's Dan Huot said during the company's Flight 6 webcast.
Meanwhile, the megarocket's second stage or Ship 31 continued skywards on the same semi-orbital trajectory that as Flight 5's, splashing down 65 minutes after liftoff, in the Indian Ocean off the northwestern coast of Australia. The splashdown which this time, occurred during the day was captured by a nearby buoy camera.
Tuesday's mission aimed, among many test objectives, to put the 50-meter-tall Ship 31 through its paces. It briefly re-lit one of its six Raptor engines for the first time, about 38 minutes into the flight. (Super Heavy employs 33 Raptors). This burn helped show that Ship can perform the maneuvers needed to come back to Earth safely during orbital missions.
Ship, like Super Heavy, is designed to be fully and rapidly reusable. SpaceX eventually intends to catch it with the chopstick arms as well. Musk in post on X Tuesday, suggested the company may try to do so during Flight 9. Landing directly on the launch mount, rather than on a ship at sea or a designated touchdown pad, will enable quicker and more efficient inspection, refurbishment and reflight, SpaceX has said.
Flight 6 also tested modifications to Ship's heat shield, which protects the vehicle during reentry to Earth's atmosphere.
"The flight test will assess new secondary thermal protection materials and will have entire sections of heat shield tiles removed on either side of the ship in locations being studied for catch-enabling hardware on future vehicles," SpaceX wrote in a mission description. "The ship also will intentionally fly at a higher angle of attack in the final phase of descent, purposefully stressing the limits of flap control to gain data on future landing profiles."
"Incredible! We really pushed the limits on Ship, and it made it all the way back down to Earth," Jessica Anderson, SpaceX manufacturing engineering manager, said during Tuesday's webcast.
"I am shocked, to be honest," added webcast co-host Kate Tice, a senior quality engineering manager at SpaceX. "I think many folks are. The fact that it survived all the way through while flying a lesser-gen heat shield is just absolutely incredible."
Flight 6 also carried the first-ever Starship payload -- a plush banana onboard Ship, which served as a zero-gravity indicator. (It was not deployed into space).
Trump made the trip to Starbase to watch Flight 6 in person. Musk contributed money and campaigned for Trump's election arguing that his opponent Kamala Harris would continue the left's anti-innovation policy of over-regulation of the engineering and tech sector.
The President-elect who will be sworn in on Jan. 20, has appointed Musk to co-lead the "Department of Government Efficiency." This advisory group, Trump said, will help his administration "dismantle Government Bureaucracy, slash excess regulations, cut wasteful expenditures and restructure Federal Agencies."
Musk is apparently targeting 25 Starship launches in 2025 and 100 a few years after that. SpaceX has already launched 113 missions of its workhorse Falcon 9 rocket so far in 2024.
The rocket company is likely to enjoy a more favorable regulatory environment under Trump. The Tesla CEO has railed repeatedly in recent months, against overzealous 'woke' regulators in the Biden administration which he argues, slow down the pace of innovation.
