SpaceX launches successful test flight of Elon Musk's Starship rocket

Starship - the biggest and most powerful rocket ever built - thundered into the evening sky from the southern tip of Texas.

SpaceX launches the 11th test flight of its mega Starship rocket

SpaceX has successfully launched another of its massive Starship rockets on a test flight, making it halfway around the world while releasing mock satellites.

Starship – the biggest and most powerful rocket ever built – thundered into the evening sky from the southern tip of Texas on Monday.

The booster peeled away and made a controlled entry into the Gulf of Mexico as planned, with the spacecraft skimming space before descending into the Indian Ocean. Nothing was recovered.

“Hey, welcome back to Earth, Starship,” SpaceX’s Dan Huot announced as employees cheered. “What a day.”

It was the 11th test flight for a full-scale Starship, which SpaceX founder and CEO Elon Musk intends to use to send people to Mars.

SpaceX’s mega rocket Starship makes a test flight from Starbase, Texas. / Credit: AP

However, the space agency Nasa’s need is more immediate. It cannot land astronauts on the moon by the end of the decade without the 403-foot (123-metre) Starship, the reusable vehicle designed to transport them from lunar orbit to the surface and back.

Instead of remaining inside Launch Control as usual, Musk said that for the first time, he was going outside to watch.

“Much more visceral,” he said.

The Starship rocket has experienced a string of recent failures, including rapid unscheduled disassemblies and engine shutdowns.

However, Starship broke its run of failures during its previous test flight in August.

More manoeuvring was built in this time, especially for the spacecraft. SpaceX conducted 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 lasted just over an hour, originating from Starbase near the Mexican border.

Nasa’s acting administrator Sean Duffy praised Starship’s progress. “Another major step toward landing Americans on the moon’s south pole,” he said on X.

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.

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