SpaceX is set to conduct its latest Starship flight on Friday, marking the first attempt to capture the spacecraft at its launch site in Texas instead of allowing it to fall into the ocean. This endeavor is a significant part of Elon Musk’s vision to establish a fully reusable rocket system.
The Starship rocket, towering at 124 meters, is slated for launch at 5:45 p.m. ET from SpaceX’s Starbase facility in southern Texas. This will be its 15th flight since the beginning of 2023 and the second mission to deploy a group of operational Starlink satellites. As such, this mission serves a dual purpose: generating revenue for its satellite connectivity business while also acting as a pivotal test for a rocket that is still under development.
As of Friday morning, SpaceX had yet to secure a launch license from the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). Historically, the FAA has issued licenses the day before previous Starship launches, but they did not provide immediate comments when approached for clarification.
Musk’s expansive company sees the next-generation Starship rocket as vital for enhancing its Starlink network with additional satellites and, in the future, for deploying a large array of AI data-processing satellites known as Starmind. This move underscores the company’s growing ambitions as an infrastructure leader.
SpaceX’s last Starship launch occurred in September, during which the rocket and its satellites successfully reached orbit for the first time, despite some engines failing mid-flight. This mission, intended to last 10 hours, concluded after approximately three hours with a successful splashdown in the Pacific Ocean.
SpaceX astounded engineers, scientists and space enthusiasts by returning its heaviest rocket booster back to its launch pad intact. Beyond the technical marvel of the Starship rocket, reusability is expected to dramatically cut back on mission costs.
For the upcoming mission, SpaceX anticipates retrieving both the Super Heavy booster and the upper stage of Starship back to Texas after launch. The upper stage, which is the rocket’s top portion serving as the spacecraft, is expected to return approximately 22 hours post-launch. SpaceX has indicated that achieving this would represent a “breakthrough moment in making Starship a reliable, rapidly reusable rocket” if everything proceeds as intended.
Preparing for Starship
SpaceX has successfully brought the 71-meter-tall Super Heavy booster back to its launchpad three times after launching Starship into space, with the booster descending vertically into large mechanical arms affixed to the launch tower about 10 minutes post-launch. The most recent “tower catch” occurred in March 2025.
For the 15th mission, SpaceX will need to relocate the Super Heavy booster off the launchpad to allow for the arrival of Starship, which is anticipated to re-enter after completing 14 orbits around Earth. This sets the stage for the inaugural Starship catch to take place around 3:45 p.m. ET on Saturday.
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Musk has indicated his goal is to achieve a weekly launch schedule for Starship by the first half of 2027, while SpaceX anticipates that operations could commence from a new launchpad in Florida by the close of 2026.
NASA has contributed approximately $3.2 billion to support the development of Starship since selecting it in 2021 as a lunar lander for its astronauts as part of the multibillion-dollar Artemis moon initiative. Meanwhile, SpaceX has invested at least $15 billion of its own funds into the development of the rocket.
Social media video recorded in Turks and Caicos shows debris streaking across the sky after the new Starship rocket broke up during a test flight.
NASA and SpaceX aim for Starship to safely land humans on the moon by 2028, although numerous significant testing milestones remain which analysts and industry experts believe may delay that timeline.
These crucial milestones involve proving complex fuel transfers between Starship “tanker” rockets in orbit — an essential process that will allow Starship to venture beyond Earth’s orbit to the moon.
Jeff Bezos’s Blue Origin is also in the process of developing a lunar lander, named Blue Moon, for NASA under the Artemis program. Blue Moon is expected to join Starship and NASA’s Orion capsule in Earth’s orbit next year for the Artemis III mission, a docking test that precedes NASA’s planned moon landing missions set to commence with Artemis IV.