SpaceX just can't catch a break, can it? After nine test flights, they still haven't figured out how to prevent Starship from blowing up or disintegrating. The narrative has always been that they would learn from each failure and take giant leaps forward with each failed mission, but after this many failures, you have to ask if that is really happening. On the surface, this mission might seem to be an incremental improvement over the last few — it made it to space and orbital speeds, after all. But, dig a little deeper, and it's evident that SpaceX has hit an impasse.
I want to give credit where credit is due: Flights 7 and 8 failed in a similar manner. They were both successfully able to land their first stage, the "Super Heavy Booster", but this isn't as impressive as landing the upper stage because the Super Heavy Booster remains in the atmosphere and has significantly less kinetic energy. During the flights, both of their upper stages exploded before they could reach orbital speeds. Flight 7 experienced a catastrophic explosion due to a massive fuel leak. Flight 8 had a rocket engine explode and take out almost all others, thanks to a "flash" event, likely caused by either a fuel leak or overheating. So, did Flight 9 solve these issues? Has SpaceX progressed?
Well, yes, kind of. But no, not really. Not at all.
This was the first time SpaceX reused a Super Heavy Booster. They only had to replace four of its 33 rocket engines, so it was impressive that none of them failed during takeoff. Unfortunately, that is where the good news ends. For reasons we will discuss in a minute, SpaceX wanted to try a new landing flight path with Starship — one that utilised atmospheric drag to slow down its descent more than its retrorockets. This meant landing with the "Chopsticks" (the launch tower arms) wasn't an option, so they aimed for a controlled splash landing in the ocean. But that didn't happen. The Super Heavy Booster broke apart just as it started its landing burn. This marks a significantly worse result than last time.
What about the upper stage? Unlike the previous two flights, this one successfully reached space, achieved orbital speeds, and even managed to shut off its engines. However, yet again, the fuel tanks sprang a massive leak, causing the upper stage to tumble out of control and break up in the atmosphere shortly after. So, even though it carried its 16-tonne dummy payload to orbital speeds (which is roughly only 10% of Starship's promised payload), it couldn't have delivered it to orbit. What's more, SpaceX likely didn't receive any useful flight data from the upper stage due to the loss of contact. So, this is a marginally better result than last time.
Is this progress? If we are being pedantic, sure. Reusing a Super Heavy Booster and reaching orbital speeds without exploding are both steps forward. But in all actuality, this was a lateral move. The result was still the same, or arguably worse: no dummy payload to orbit and two failed landings.
Okay, but I can already hear the Musk fans pearl-clutching and screaming, "We learn from failure!" Fair enough. Let's look at the lessons we can glean from these results.
Firstly, why did SpaceX try a new landing path for Super Heavy, even though they have successfully landed it multiple times? Well, weight. Starship weighs far too much, meaning its possible payload is vanishingly small, and its engines are being overstressed (hence the constant engine failures). SpaceX must make Starship lighter for it to even have a chance of being functional. The heaviest component of a rocket, particularly a self-landing one, is fuel. In fact, there is a double weight-saving opportunity there, but we don't have time to go into that today. Super Heavy Booster's previous landing relied almost entirely on retrorockets, making it predictable but incredibly fuel-hungry. This new path attempted to replace the bulk of that fuel requirement with atmospheric drag by allowi
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