It has only been a matter of months since the SpaceX Starship prototype took flight for the first time, but SpaceX CEO Elon Musk has announced that they want to move ahead with high-altitude testing.
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The timelines attached to SpaceX projects have always been extremely ambitious. While they weren’t able to get to the testing phase within the original six month target back in 2019, SpaceX has still made swift progress. The latest prototype has been dubbed the SN8, and has already undergone a successful static fire ignition test.
Starship SN8 Static Fire!
— Chris B – NSF (@NASASpaceflight) November 24, 2020
Overview Article for this test:https://t.co/E3v5cOyEAt
Mary (@BocaChicaGal) livestreaming with the NSF Crew.
➡️https://t.co/UzsoAgGWLF pic.twitter.com/2E2eeWtvkq
The next step is a test flight, up to an altitude of 15km, which SpaceX is planning to do next week. It will test the vehicle’s engines, body flaps, and fuel tanks and the craft will hopefully return to earth in one piece.
Good Starship SN8 static fire! Aiming for first 15km / ~50k ft altitude flight next week. Goals are to test 3 engine ascent, body flaps, transition from main to header tanks & landing flip.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 24, 2020
The latest SN8 prototype looks more like a real rocket, and it has a trio of Raptor engines. The finished “Starhopper” Starship will have six of the raptor engines when it finally takes flight. SpaceX plans to then use the Starship for all missions, replacing the Falcon 9 rocket it currently uses for its missions. It could still be several years for this to come to fruition, as we saw with the Falcon 9 development and passenger certification taking years to complete.
The first crewed flight for the Starship is planned for 2023, when it will send paying customers around the moon. The first flight if the SpaceX moon voyage will include Yusaku Maezawa, a Japanese billionaire, who is running an odd competition to take a companion with him.
