SpaceX has shared a cinematic video (above) of the Starship rocket’s sixth test flight, which took place in November.
The presentation is effectively a teaser for the megarocket’s seventh test flight, which is expected to take place in the next week, though an official announcement regarding timing has yet to be made.
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SpaceX’s video pulls together some of the most awe-inspiring footage captured during the Starship’s sixth test flight. Stunning close-ups, dramatic wide shots, and incredible action clips give fans their best look yet at the entirety of the mission that tested the most powerful rocket ever to fly.
The Starship vehicle uses the Super Heavy booster for the first stage and the Starship spacecraft for the upper stage. A total of 33 Raptor engines provide the 120-meter-tall rocket with 17 million pounds of thrust during launches from SpaceX’s Starbase facility near Boca Chica in Texas.
In the sixth test flight, the Super Heavy booster successfully transitioned to its boostback burn to begin its return to the launch site. The original plan was to use two large mechanical arms on the launch tower to “catch” the booster as it came in to land, a feat that it achieved at the first attempt in the fifth test flight in October. But automated health checks of critical hardware on the launch and catch tower surfaced an issue that triggered an abort of the catch attempt. As a result, the booster performed a divert maneuver and a landing burn to send it into the Gulf of Mexico.
After being deployed by the Super Heavy, the Starship spacecraft completed another successful ascent, placing it on the planned trajectory. “The ship successfully reignited a single Raptor engine while in space, demonstrating the capabilities required to conduct a ship deorbit burn before starting fully orbital missions,” SpaceX said. “With live views and telemetry being relayed by Starlink, the ship successfully made it through reentry and executed a flip, landing burn, and soft splashdown in the Indian Ocean.”
The Elon Musk-led company said that data gathered from the mission provided invaluable feedback that can be used to further improve the rocket’s flight systems. “Lessons learned will directly make the entire Starship system more reliable as we close in on full and rapid reusability,” it said.
NASA and SpaceX are planning to use the Starship for crew and cargo flights to the moon, Mars, and possibly beyond. There’s still much testing to be done, with SpaceX aiming to increase the frequency of its Starship flights in 2025. We’ll share details of the schedule for the seventh flight just as soon as it becomes known.