SpaceX Starship megarocket hits key milestones in ‘Lucky 13’ test flight as big hurdles loom
Updated 10:22 PM EDT, Fri July 24, 2026
The SpaceX Starship is seen floating in the Indian Ocean after splashdown on Friday.
SpaceX
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• SpaceX completed a test flight of its Starship megarocket, following an aborted launch attempt last week in which several engines failed to ignite at liftoff.
• The test flight, called Flight 13, hit several key milestonesbefore concluding with a controlled splashdown of the upper Starship spacecraft in the Indian Ocean. The Super Heavy rocket booster, which detached from Starship two minutes into the flight, made a controlled splashdown in the Gulf.
• Flight 13 marked the second, and a more successful, test for this version of Starship, called V3. During the first flight of a Starship V3 rocket in May, a series of engine outages caused the rocket to underperform.
• SpaceX is facing intense pressure to get Starship ready for a crucial NASA test flight next year that could pave the way for the next moon landing.
• This flight was also the first for SpaceX as a publicly traded company. Last week’s aborted launch attempt sparked a selloff, and shares are still trading below their IPO price.
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17 hr 56 min ago
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We’ve wrapped up our live coverage of SpaceX Starship’s 13th test flight. Follow more CNN space stories here .
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17 hr 9 min ago
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To cap off the roaring success of today’s flight test, SpaceX shared some stunning visuals of the upper Starship spacecraft sailing through space.
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18 hr 15 min ago
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Today’s flight marked a much better showing for Starship V3 than its first go in May. (As a reminder: SpaceX debuted this latest upgraded version of Starship earlier this year, following a tense period of mixed success with Starship V2 in 2025.)
During Starship V3’s inaugural test, there were numerous engine issues as several on the booster failed to relight and the Starship spacecraft experienced a nail-biting engine outage. SpaceX also was forced to replace six engines on this vehicle ahead of today’s flight because of a likely issue with moisture that prevented at least four from starting up correctly during an initial launch attempt last week.
But tonight’s test went quite smoothly. It spurred SpaceX spokesperson Dan Huot to deem this mission “Lucky Number 13,” as this was the 13th integrated test flight of a Starship spacecraft and Super Heavy rocket booster.
Here’s a look back at how things went down:
The Super Heavy rocket booster fired all 33 of its engines in a pristine performance off the launchpad. The rocket booster also managed to relight 13 engines, as planned, to steer itself back toward a controlled landing. Only when Super Heavy attempted to relight its engines for a controlled landing burn over the Gulf waters did problems arise. The landing was still controlled, though Huot said the vehicle was traveling a bit faster than the company had hoped when it made touchdown. (SpaceX always intended to discard this Super Heavy booster in the ocean.)
The Starship spacecraft had no obvious performance issues, making it all the way through its engine burn and managing to reignite one engine mid-flight as part of a test. It also made a controlled splashdown in the Indian Ocean — executing its “softest splashdown” to date in a “dream scenario,” according to SpaceX’s Dan Huot. The touchdown came about an hour after takeoff, as planned.
During its coasting phase, Starship also deployed 20 Starlink test satellites, paving the way for operational missions later down the line in which SpaceX plans to deploy large batches of these satellites in a single launch. In another big win, SpaceX said it was able to make contact with each of those satellites.
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18 hr 27 min ago
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SpaceX has put a lot of effort into studying how Starship’s heat shield has performed.
The heat shield is key: It’s a layer of ceramic tiles on the exterior of the upper Starship — or “ship” — that is designed to protect the vehicle as it plunges back into Earth’s thick atmosphere while still traveling more than 20 times the speed of sound. It can generate temperatures half as hot as the surface of the sun.
During Starship’s test flight campaign, SpaceX has gone out of its way to evaluate how its heat shield has performed across every phase of flight.
Takeoff of today’s mission, in fact, was delayed from yesterday because SpaceX wanted clear weather to keep eyes on how the heat shield looked during its initial ascent. SpaceX has also equipped satellites with cameras specifically to watch how the heat shield looks as Starship cruises through space.
After today’s largely successful test mission, Musk celebrated how well Starship’s heat shield held up — marking a significant improvement over prior tests.
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19 hr 2 min ago
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Overall, today’s flight showed that Starship V3 might be a winning design for SpaceX.
From here, however, SpaceX still needs to pursue some ambitious next steps in its development program. The company needs to test how Starship will enter Earth’s orbit. It also needs to figure out how it can be topped off with fuel while sitting in space, a step that will be required if Starship is going to land astronauts on the moon, as is the company’s plan.
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19 hr 13 min ago
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The wins are racking up for today’s mission.
SpaceX confirmed on Elon Musk’s social media platform X that the company was able to make contact with all 20 Starlink satellites it deployed during this mission.
As a reminder, the satellites were functional — but they weren’t designed to stay in space. Each burned up in the atmosphere about 20 minutes after deploying from the upper Starship spacecraft midway through its test flight today.
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19 hr 15 min ago
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NASA administrator Jared Isaacman, who took over the top job at the agency in December and previously paid his way to space aboard a SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule, gave a cheeky nod to today’s Starship test flight.
He shared an image of Starship’s liftoff with the moon visible in the background and joked, “SpaceX knows where we are going!”
SpaceX’s Starship development program is facing a dramatic time crunch, as NASA hopes to use the vehicle to put its astronauts on the moon as soon as 2028 — aiming to beat its rival China. But Starship has a long way to go before it’s ready to fly with people, much less execute a crewed lunar touchdown.
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19 hr 27 min ago
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The SpaceX Starship is seen floating in the Indian Ocean after splashdown on Friday.
SpaceX
“I’m losing my mind right now,” SpaceX spokesperson Dan Huot said as Starship continued to dispatch live views even as it bobbed in the Indian Ocean after a controlled splashdown.
Huot called the touchdown a “dream scenario,” noting, “this is the first time we’ve put an intact Starship in the water.”
“Lucky Number 13,” he mused, reffering to the fact that this is Starship’s 13th flight of a fully integrated Starship and Super Heavy. This was also only the second test flight for this version of prototype, called Starship V3.
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19 hr 32 min ago
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Starship just relit its engines and made its “softest splashdown” yet, according to SpaceX’s Dan Huot.
The touchdown maneuver appeared to be pristine, with Starship swooping up from its bellyflop position and landing upright atop the water. It then slowly tipped over and appeared to begin floating in the sea.
The visuals sparked an eruption of cheers from employees viewing the landing back at Starbase.
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19 hr 35 min ago
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Starship is now “subsonic” — meaning it shed thousands of miles per hour as it plunged back into Earth’s atmosphere, going from traveling over Mach 20 (or 20 times the speed of sound), to under Mach 1, which is about 767 miles per hour.
Starship has not encountered any obvious issues during this flight thus far. Its next major milestone is to relight its engines as it completes a belly-flop maneuver before swinging upright and attempting a controlled landing in the Indian Ocean.
This final landing burn is meant to serve as a test as SpaceX works to hash out how it might return Starship back to dry land after flight so that it can be rapidly flown again. Reusing rocket parts is central to SpaceX’s business plan — angling to drive down the cost of each launch, the company says, by orders of magnitude.
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19 hr 50 min ago
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A pink plasma field can be seen around the vehicle as it begins reentry on Friday.
SpaceX
A halo of neon pink plasma just appeared around Starship. It’s a signature visual indication that Starship is beginning its plunge back to Earth.
Plasma is created when Starship, traveling more than 20 times the speed of sound, slams into air molecules. Hitting the atmosphere at such velocities creates a wave of pressure that can rip air particles apart, forming a buildup of colorful plasma.
Protecting Starship during the leg of the journey is its heat shield — a coating of hexagonal, black tiles that are made of a special ceramic designed to radiate heat away.
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19 hr 59 min ago
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Starship V3 just notched another victory it didn’t quite make during its last flight in May: It successfully reignited one if its engines in the vacuum of space.
SpaceX previously accomplished an engine relight test on Flight 6 in November 2024, Flight 10 in August and Flight 11 in October. But during Flight 12 in May, SpaceX was forced to abandon the test because of engine outage issues.
Being able to turn engines off and on again in space is crucial.
It’ll give Starship the flexiblity to complete complex missions, allowing it to change its orbital trajectory or perform a “reentry burn” to allow it maneuver nimbly through the final, most dangerous stretch of the mission when Starship plunges back into the think inner band of Earth’s atmosphere while still traveling more than 20 times the speed of sound.
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20 hr 3 min ago
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Starship is seen coasting after the completion of the satellite deployment on Friday.
SpaceX
The Starship vehicle just finished deploying 20 test satellites, and it’s now coasting as it awaits its next major milestones.
At T+38 minutes and 58 seconds, Starship will briefly try to relight one of its six engines.
Then, at T+47 and a half minutes, Starship will begin its nail-biting plunge back into Earth’s atmosphere before it attempts a controlled landing in the Indian Ocean.
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20 hr 13 min ago
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Starship is the biggest rocket ever created — by far.
20260514-spacex-starship-comparison
Saturn V
363 ft
N1
(Russia)
344 ft
Space Shuttle
184 ft
FalconHeavy
230 ft
Space LaunchSystem
322 ft
Starship
407 ft
The towering megarocket stands at nearly 400 feet (121 meters) tall and, with the debut of Version 3, packs around 18 million pounds of force at liftoff.
Here’s how it stacks up to some of the largest rockets ever constructed, past and present.
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Saturn V: The famous NASA rocket that powered the Apollo moon landings of the 20th century put out about 7.6 million pounds of thrust at takeoff. That’s still less than half of Starship’s expected power. It stood at about 360 feet (110 meters) tall.
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Russian N1 rocket: This was Russia’s megamoon rocket of the 20th century space race. And while it was never operational (all four launch attempts failed), Musk has said it’s the closest relative of Starship’s design. The N1 was expected to give off more than 10 million pounds of thrust at liftoff — still well below Starship’s specs.
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The Space Shuttle: NASA’s workhorse launch system in the post-Apollo era, the shuttle had two solid rocket boosters that gave off about 5.3 million pounds of force at liftoff. It was about 180 feet (55 meters) tall.
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Falcon Heavy: SpaceX’s own 230-foot-tall (70-meter-tall) rocket that previously held the title for most powerful operational rocket in the world. It has about 5 million pounds of thrust.
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Space Launch System: NASA’s new moon rocket, which powered the historic Artemis II lunar flyby mission in April, is currently the most powerful rocket in operation. It produces about 8.8 million pounds of thrust — less than half the Starship V3’s expected output at liftoff. SLS’s Block 1 variant is about 322 feet (98.15 meters) tall.
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20 hr 16 min ago
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Starlink satellites are deployed, with an interior view on the left, and and an exterior view on the right.
SpaceX
The first Starlink V3 satellite have officially reached space — though they’ll only be in space about 20 minutes.
SpaceX plans to test deploying the solar arrays, and six of the 20 satellites are outfitted with cameras that will snap some pictures of Starship to help engineers collect data.
Though these Starlink V3 satellites won’t be operational, eventually SpaceX aims to use Starship to deploy these by the batch-load. The newer version is supposed to give SpaceX’s existing network a major capacity upgrade.
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20 hr 22 min ago
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SpaceX says the Starship flying today’s mission has 20 Starlink satellites on board, the first of the latest version of the internet-beaming satellites that will reach space.
But they won’t stay in orbit: The satellites — like Starship itself — will be on a suborbital trajectory, which means they’re expected to burn up in Earth’s atmosphere upon reentry.
Each of the satellites will be folded flat and ejected from a narrow slit in Starship’s side, which acts as a sort of high-tech Pez dispenser.
SpaceX has attempted to test this deployment with dummy satellites on each of the last six test flights. But today’s mission will have actual Starlink V3 satellites that will deploy solar panels and antennas. They’ll briefly attempt to connect to the company’s existing Starlink network using lasers.
And before their demise, about 20 minutes after deployment, the Starlink satellites will aim to collect some data about Starship: “Six of the satellites have been modified with a suite of cameras to scan Starship’s heat shield and transmit imagery down to operators.”
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20 hr 24 min ago
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The Super Heavy booster makes a controlled splashdown on Friday.
SpaceX
In a big victory, the Super Heavy booster made a clean, controlled splashdown, though SpaceX spokesperson Dan Huot noted on the livestream that it appears all 13 of the vehicles engines did not light on the landing burn.
During the last test flight in May, Super Heavy had spun out of control as it experienced issues getting its engines relit after a wild separation from the upper Starship craft.
Cheers rang out among employees watching the launch as Super Heavy made its touchdown today.
One caveat, SpaceX’s Dan Huot said the landing velocity was a “little bit high” — but he’s still marking it as a big step forward.
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20 hr 33 min ago
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The Super Heavy booster is so far performing much better than last time. Dan Huot, a SpaceX spokesperson, said the booster got all 33 engines lit at takeoff and used 13 engines for the boostback burn. It’s aiming for a controlled splashdown in the ocean.
Starship, meanwhile, is cruising — showing all six engines lit successfully.
This is already a stronger performance than Flight 12 in May.
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20 hr 37 min ago
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The Starship spacecraft and Super Heavy rocket booster just made it through a crucial moment in the mission: stage separation.
That’s when Super Heavy shuts down most of its engines in a moment called “main engine cutoff,” or MECO, as the rocket booster has now burned through most of its fuel.
Starship then ignited its own engines and thrust itself away from the Super Heavy booster in a maneuver SpaceX calls “hot staging.”
This maneuver was carefully tweaked for today’s flight. During the last test run in May, the upper Starship vehicle — or “ship” — did not fire all six of its engines at the same time, causing the Super Heavy booster below to flip in the wrong direction.
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20 hr 38 min ago
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The Starship spacecraft and Super Heavy booster just soared through the first crucial milestone: Max Q.
That’s an aerospace term that refers to the point during flight at which a vehicle experiences peak stress — when it is traveling very fast while the atmosphere is still quite thick, putting the highest strain on the spacecraft.
Remember: On this mission, Max Q was expected to be the most intense yet. SpaceX said it would attempt a “higher dynamic pressure on ascent than previous flights” in the hopes that Starship can survive the stresses. This tougher flight path allows Starship to save fuel, increasing the total mass it can carry to orbit.
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