IT Home reported on March 7 that according to a post quietly published by SpaceX on the social ** platform X about the live launch, the company plans to conduct its third test flight of Starship on March 14. The Starship consists of a reusable upper stage (also known as a Starship) made of stainless steel and a Super Heavy booster, both of which together exceed 122 meters in height.
For this test flight, SpaceX recently conducted critical fuel tests at its Starbase facility near Boca Chica, Texas. During the test, more than 10 million pounds of liquid methane and liquid oxygen were injected into the rocket. SpaceX CEO Elon Musk posted a fuel test on X with caption: "Starship 3 is preparing for launch. ”
Both the Starship and Super Heavy boosters are designed to be fully reusable and are currently the most powerful rockets in the world, capable of putting up to 150 tons of cargo into orbit, according to IT House. NASA has selected Starship to send its astronauts to the moon for the Artemis 3 mission, which can take place as early as 2026.
However, there are a few hurdles that Starship needs to overcome before it can achieve this goal. First, it needs to reach orbit first. In the first two test flights, conducted in April and November 2023, Starship failed to achieve this goal.
During the first test flight, Starship failed to separate from its first-stage booster and began to roll, with SpaceX detonating the rocket less than four minutes after liftoff.
During the second test flight, Starship successfully separated from the Super Heavy booster after about 2 minutes and 40 seconds of flight, but the Super Heavy booster then made a huge ** in the air.
After the second test flight, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) asked SpaceX to take 17 corrective actions before the next flight, 10 for Starship and seven for Super Heavy boosters.
SpaceX said in a Feb. 26 statement that it has completed the measures, noting that the company has "implemented hardware changes on the upcoming starship to reduce leaks, improve fire performance, and improve operations related to propellant emissions to improve reliability." ”