Starship, the most powerful rocket in the world, intended for trips to the Moon and Mars, will attempt a new flight on June 5, SpaceX, its manufacturer, announced Friday.
• Read also: SpaceX “lost” its Starship at the end of the third test flight
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The firing window from the Starbase space base in Boca Chica, in the far south of Texas, begins at 7 a.m. local time (12 p.m. GMT), subject to the green light from the American air traffic regulator (FAA).
This will be the fourth test for the largest rocket in the world with its length of around 120 meters.
SpaceX is banking on Starship to achieve its goal of making humanity a multi-planetary species, by installing it on Mars.
Its development is also very important for NASA, which is counting on this spacecraft to land its astronauts on the Moon during its Artemis 3 mission, planned for 2026.
The first three tests resulted in the destruction of Starship, acceptable risks for SpaceX whose development strategy involves speed with successive tests. These allow the company to make rapid modifications to its machine.
The rocket is made up of two stages: the Super Heavy propulsion stage and, above it, the Starship, which by extension gives its name to the entire rocket.
“The fourth test flight allows us to move from orbit to demonstrating the return and reuse capability of Starship and Super Heavy,” SpaceX said in a statement.
The flight path is similar to that chosen for the third test which took place in March. Starship had flown halfway around the globe before exploding upon re-entering the atmosphere above the Indian Ocean.
This time, SpaceX is hoping for a soft landing of Super Heavy in the Gulf of Mexico and a “controlled entry” into the craft’s atmosphere.
Ultimately, Starship, which is still a prototype, must be fully reusable.
The development of SpaceX’s Falcon rockets, which with 96 successful missions in 2023 today dominate the American launch market, was also based on multiple apparently failed tests.
