SpaceX Aborts Super Heavy Catch and Deploys Starlink Satellites

SpaceX sent the first-stage rocket to the Gulf of Mexico after an automatic abort during a planned booster catch on Friday.

Starship Flight 15 Launch

The 124m-tall rocket lifted off from the Starbase launchpad in Boca Chica, Texas at 1645 local time, according to BBC News. The Orlando Sentinel reported the liftoff time as 5:47 p.m. EST.

All 33 engines functioned properly on ascent. But the first-stage booster malfunctioned and missed its scheduled return to the launch tower, splashing down in the Gulf of Mexico instead, as detailed by Yahoo Tech.

During the launch stream, a SpaceX spokesperson addressed the diversion.

“Safety is always the number one priority, and we’re still testing out things that we haven’t done before on these vehicles, and so we are prioritising making sure that we can perform each maneuver safely,” said a SpaceX spokesperson.

Orbital Journey and Satellites

The upper stage continued its trajectory into space. The vehicle deployed 26 Starlink satellites into orbit, according to the Orlando Sentinel.

The flight profile called for the upper stage to complete 14 orbits over 22.5 hours before returning to the Texas launch site for a potential tower catch attempt, said BBC News.

Florida Infrastructure Expansion

The mission precedes operational launches from the Space Coast. SpaceX has constructed a launch tower and Gigabay factory at Kennedy Space Center’s Space Launch Complex 39-A.

“It’ll be ready a little later this month,” said Jessie Anderson, a SpaceX commentator.

The Super Heavy booster and the Ship form the world’s biggest and most powerful rocket, standing at 407 feet in height. SpaceX aimed for a 22-hour flight to accelerate moon and Mars travel. “Starship, we're going to catch both the first stage and second stage,” SpaceX vice president of launch Kiko Dontchev said at a NASA tech summit at Florida's Kennedy Space Center.

NASA is paying SpaceX billions of dollars to land Artemis astronauts on the moon using Starships, with Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin serving as another major player in the program. That work will set the stage for an Artemis moon touchdown as early as 2028.