It was Lucky 13 for SpaceX, as new videos show just how much work came into getting the latest flight of Starship’s upper stage softly down into the ocean.
After Starship made its 13th launch on Friday (July 24) from SpaceX’s Starbase site in South Texas, the upper stage achieved all major milestones: putting 20 next-gen Starlink satellites aloft to watch it go, reigniting a Raptor engine in space, and then the soft splashdown off the coast of Western Australia.
While the lower stage of Starship faced engine issues, fresh video shows some incredible views of the successful upper stage. Starlink satellites, ferrying signal from a buoy in the Indian Ocean, helped create a video on X showing the 171-foot (52-meter) upper stage roaring above the water, then generating steam as the engines swiveled to make a gentle splashdown.
Getting down that way was no easy feat, as SpaceX posted another video on Tuesday (July 28) showing Starship swaying dramatically in midair to achieve a near-vertical orientation above the water. If you don’t mind a bit of vertigo, SpaceX also provided an on-ship view of the splashdown, complete with dramatic swings and ocean steam.
The upper stage’s ocean arrival was so soft, in fact, that days after launch on July 28 the 171-foot (52-meter) stage was reported as still afloat in the Indian Ocean, SpaceX said on X, adding that its Starship recovery team is continuing to gather imagery of the vehicle at sea.
Starship’s Version 3 (which flew on Friday) is a 408-foot-tall stacked system including the Super Heavy booster and the upper stage, also known as Starship (or Ship). SpaceX aims to make this system rapidly reusable for applications ranging from astronaut moon missions to launching even more powerful and larger Starlinks.
That said, SpaceX still needs to notch some goals ahead of its expected participation for docking during the Artemis III astronaut mission scheduled for next year, and to possibly bring astronauts to the moon’s surface during Artemis IV.
And Ars Technica (quoting experts) recently raised concerns about the Starship heatshield, noting more changes will be required for reusability.