SpaceX launches 11th test flight of giant Super Heavy-Starship rocket

SpaceX launched its Super Heavy-Starship rocket on Monday for the 11th time, marking another successful test flight that built upon previous launches.

Elon Musk, SpaceX founder and CEO, briefly made an appearance on the company’s livestream ahead of the launch, saying it was the first time that he was going to be outside to watch the rocket. 

“Normally I’m in mission control and stuff,” Musk told the livestream hosts. “It’s really going to be much more visceral.”

Shortly after, Starship — the biggest and most powerful rocket ever built — thundered into the evening sky from the southern tip of Texas. The booster peeled away and made a controlled entry into the Gulf as planned, with the spacecraft skimming space before descending into the Indian Ocean. Nothing was being recovered.

It was the 11th test flight for a full-scale Starship, which Musk intends to use to send people to Mars. NASA’s need is more immediate. The space agency cannot land astronauts on the moon by decade’s end without the 403-foot Starship, the reusable vehicle meant to get them from lunar orbit down to the surface and back up.

The previous test flight in August — a success after a string of explosive failures — followed a similar path with similar goals. More maneuvering was built in this time, especially for the spacecraft. SpaceX planned a series of tests during the spacecraft’s entry over the Indian Ocean as practice for future landings back at the launch site.

Like before, Starship carried up eight mock satellites mimicking SpaceX’s Starlinks. The entire flight was meant to last just over an hour, originating from Starbase near the Mexican border. 

SpaceX is modifying its Cape Canaveral launch sites to accommodate Starships, in addition to the much smaller Falcon rockets used to transport astronauts and supplies to the International Space Station for NASA.