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SpaceX’s Starship rocket successfully took off from Texas last week for its 11th test flight – but industry experts say it still has a way to go before it’s ready for ambitious space exploration projects.
During the testThe spacecraft’s booster fired its 33 engines to get the spacecraft off the ground, and as it lifted off, it fired six more engines to pierce Earth’s atmosphere, the Elon Musk-owned company said. When it took off, it released eight fake SpaceX satellites and restarted one of its engines in space.
SpaceX’s Starship, the most powerful rocket ever built, will likely be spear for the American Artemis III mission in 2027, which will see humans return to the surface of the Moon for the first time since the 1960s. The goal is to ultimately use the Starship for missions to the Moon and Mars in the 2030s.
So, what’s next for SpaceX and future Mars missions after the successful launch? Space industry experts have said SpaceX still needs to complete many technical steps before sending humans to the Moon.
“Time is running out”
Starship is being developed for three very different simultaneous missions: deployment of Starlink satellites, Artemis III missions to the Moon, and possible long-range exploration missions to Mars.
Starship still needs to overcome many obstacles before it is ready to take humans to the Moon, according to Lars Petzold, a researcher at the European Science Policy Institute (ESPI) think tank.
“There are a lot of things that SpaceX still has to prove and they are, of course, very cautious because time is running out for them,” Petzold said.
Petzold estimated that SpaceX uses launches like this to “incrementally” build out its capabilities, meaning the company could then try to demonstrate whether the craft is capable of getting into orbit.
“At the moment, all Starship launchers are suborbital, so they have not completed a full Earth orbit,” he said.
Pierre Lionnet, director general of space industry trade association ASD-Eurospace, said the fact that Starship has remained suborbital until now means it has not been able to deploy a satellite into orbit, which would be one of its operational strengths.
“I expected to see it on the second or third launch,” he said. “Usually when you test a launch vehicle, you test it… to put satellites into orbit. Nobody cares what a launch vehicle does.”
After reaching orbit, SpaceX is expected to demonstrate that it can transfer propellant to refuel the Starship between two different craft, which Petzold called a “crucial” part of the process for missions to the Moon or Mars.
That’s because the ship will need more fuel mid-mission to make the long flight, Petzold said.
Moving liquid gas between two bodies in space “is a major feat that has never been done before,” Lionnet said.
“Here we’re talking about moving literally hundreds of tons of these fluids from one vessel to another in order to fill it,” he said, noting that the lack of gravity will make it difficult to transfer liquid from one vessel to another.
“Everyone is convinced that this is a very complex thing to achieve,” he added.
Ten or twenty more tests needed for Artemis III 2027, experts say
Whether Starship can meet the 2027 deadline for Artemis III missions depends on how upcoming tests go, Petzold said.
He estimated that it would take at least 10 or 20 more tests before humans could board, provided no investigations were carried out after failed attempts.
Other missions will need to show that the spacecraft can reach lunar orbit, that it can dock with existing infrastructure on the Moon and that it can land successfully with humans on board, Petzold said.
Lionnet said there are also many “configurations” regarding the Artemis III missions that need to be tested.
“The launch system to go to the Moon, what would it look like? Will it carry solar panels? Will it have landing legs… will it have habitation compartments, how will the door open, will it have a crane to get the astronauts to the surface of the Moon?” said Lionnet. “All these things, they don’t exist.”
Another element that needs to be tested is the reuse of the craft, which SpaceX has touted as one of the Starship’s main features, Lionnet said.
Although the company was able to demonstrate that it could get its booster, the Falcon 9, through maintenance and ready for another launch in eight or nine days, Lionnet said the upper portion of the rocket faces a more challenging environment returning to Earth, which will require more time for maintenance.
“If you watch the videos of these ships coming back to Earth, they’re covered in flames… it looks really burnt and scarred looking at them,” he said. “It is very difficult to believe that the same object can be put back into service immediately.”
Technical feats to come with the new Starship model
Some of the engineering displays are expected to be accompanied by a new version 3 model of the Starship, SpaceX spokesman Dan Huot said during the webcast of the 11th flight.
The new craft will have “really significant changes…under the hood,” Huot said, so the company can start mass producing them and using them for launching satellites.
Among the changes are propulsion and energy modifications to the top of the craft that Huot says will help it survive longer missions far from Earth.
A new fuel transfer tube for Starship will have “a rocket inside a rocket” that will give SpaceX a faster way to start its 33 engines at the same time.
Version 3 ships will also have docking adapters to bring two Starship capsules together for a “propellant transfer,” Huot said.
For Petzold, version 3 of the craft is geared toward “operational use” of the Starship, potentially allowing it to send Starlink satellites into orbit, but not near the missions to the Moon or Mars that are widely expected.
