Elon Musk plans second test of SpaceX’s Starship rocket after April crash

Elon Musk’s Starship will make its second launch attempt on Saturday after its first effort ended in a fireball minutes after blast off. 

The billionaire’s 390ft tall rocket, which has been picked to carry a mission to the moon by 2025 and is intended to one day take humans to Mars, will take off from a launch pad at Starbase in Texas. 

The last launch attempt on 20 April ended in failure after the SpaceX rocket’s first and second stages failed to separate, sending it into a tailspin and ending with a fireball.

When is the second Starship flight?

Starship was originally planning to launch at 8am CT local time (1pm UK) on Friday, November 17, with a two-hour launch window.

However, Mr Musk, the 52-year-old Tesla billionaire, said the launch was being delayed until Saturday as SpaceX needed to “replace a grid fin actuator”. He did not give a time on Saturday when the launch might take place.

If this does not go ahead, there are backup windows on November 18, 19 and 20. 

Space launches can be delayed by technical hitches or bad weather. SpaceX halted its last launch attempt after a malfunction before trying again three days later. 

Where to watch the launch

SpaceX will stream the launch on its website and on YouTube. You will also be able to view the livestream on the Telegraph website or follow our live blog. 

What to expect from the Starship countdown 

The live stream will begin around thirty minutes before blast off. The company’s rocket is made up of two stages, a 230ft booster section and the 164ft Starship module, which will travel through space. 

The rocket weighs a total of 5,000 tonnes and is capable of lifting a 250 tonne payload into orbit. The rocket itself generates 17 million pounds of thrust, double that of the Saturn V rockets that carried the original Moon landing missions. 

The rocket’s 39 raptor engines will begin to chill around 20 minutes before launch. 

Ten seconds before take off, SpaceX will activate its flame deflector, a powerful water system that is designed to dampen the explosive power of the rocket’s engines to protect the rocket and the launchpad. 

With three seconds before lift off, its raptor engine sequence will begin. SpaceX says: “Excitement guaranteed.”

After lifting off, the rocket will take 52 seconds to reach its moment of maximum mechanical stress – or max Q – before attempting to separate its first and second stages three minutes into the flight.

The booster will then return to earth, attempting a splash landing in the sea. If all goes well, the Starship module will cruise for around an hour, before reentry and a water landing. Ultimately, SpaceX intends to make both sections of the rocket fully reusable. 

What happened to the first Starship launch? 

While that is the theory, the first mission ended early – and with a bang.

The rocket suffered from a “rapid unscheduled disassembly” as it attempted to reach space for the first time. 

The company said: “As if the flight test was not exciting enough, Starship experienced a rapid unscheduled disassembly before stage separation.” 

Such was the power of the rocket’s engines when it blasted off, the Starship left a vast crater in the ground and damaged much of the ground infrastructure around the launch tower. 

Despite its fiery ending, SpaceX said the first test flight “provided numerous lessons learned that directly contributed to several upgrades to both the vehicle and ground infrastructure to improve the probability of success on future flights”. 

The company said its “iterative development approach has been the basis for all of SpaceX’s major innovative advancements”. 

“Recursive improvement is essential as we work to build a fully reusable transportation system capable of carrying both crew and cargo to Earth orbit, to help humanity return to the Moon, and ultimately travel to Mars and beyond.”