SpaceX plans to capture both stages of the Starship rocket system within the same mission for the first time. The company’s CEO, Elon Musk, announced at the third quarter financial results meeting held on Tuesday that it is aimed to bring both the Super Heavy booster and the Starship spacecraft back to the launch site in the flight planned to be held next month. If the trial is completed successfully, it will be the first time that both stages of a launch system capable of reaching orbit have been fully recovered. Thus, SpaceX aims to leave behind another technical stage that it has been working on for a long time in terms of Starship’s reusability goal.
Elon Musk described the planned experiment as a remarkable development in terms of the development of space technologies. However, he acknowledged that success was not guaranteed in the first attempts. According to Musk, the probability of both vehicles being caught on the next flight seems higher than the possibility of failure. However, a possible failure is not expected to stop the Starship program’s flight schedule. Musk stated that regular Starship flights will continue until the end of the year, and tests will be carried out at a higher frequency next year.
SpaceX aims to capture both Starship stages in launch tower
Starship consists of a first stage booster called Super Heavy and a second stage spacecraft of the same name. The system, which has a height of approximately 120 meters and a diameter of 9 meters, works with Raptor engines developed by SpaceX. In these engines, liquid methane is used as fuel and liquid oxygen is used as oxidizer. In the design of Starship, which was first introduced in 2018, one of the main goals is to reuse both stages after the mission. Unlike traditional landing systems, SpaceX envisions the vehicles returning to the launch tower and being caught in the air with the help of mechanical arms on the tower.
These mechanical arms, which the company calls “chopsticks”, were developed to ensure that the vehicle descends in a controlled manner and is held by the tower during landing. Such a system allows the rocket to be recovered without the need for landing legs. However, capturing two different stages of the approximately 120-meter launch system in the same mission requires precise guidance and engine control. In particular, Starship needs to re-enter the atmosphere after its orbital flight, reduce its speed and head towards the launch site. Applying the capture approach used in the return of Super Heavy to the second stage stands out as one of the necessary conditions for the system to become fully reusable.
In SpaceX’s Starship flight last month, two separate targets were achieved for the first time. As the Starship spacecraft was sent into Earth orbit, several dozen of the company’s larger and more advanced V3 Starlink satellites were added to the satellite network for the first time. Thus, the flight was not limited to testing the rocket system alone, and Starship’s satellite carrying capacity was also evaluated within the scope of an operational mission. However, an engine problem experienced during the mission caused the planned flight profile to be changed. When one of the Raptor engines shut down earlier than expected during the takeoff phase, the mission control team made arrangements to complete the ascent with the remaining engines.
Following the engine failure, SpaceX prematurely terminated the mission, which was originally planned to last about 10 hours and make six trips around the Earth. Starship completed its mission after approximately three hours of flight and two orbits around the Earth. While the Super Heavy booster made a controlled descent into the Gulf of Mexico, Starship’s upper stage performed its deorbit maneuver. The spacecraft then crashed vertically and in flames into the Pacific Ocean north of Hawaii. Neither of the two stages of the system was recovered on this flight.
The double capture attempt planned for the next flight will, unlike the previous mission, focus not only on the completion of the flight but also on the physical recovery of the vehicles. The reuse approach, which SpaceX has been applying for a long time in its Falcon 9 rockets, is intended to be implemented more comprehensively in Starship. While the first stage of Falcon 9 can be reused after missions, in the Starship system, it is aimed to prepare both the booster and the upper stage for flight again. If this approach is successful, it has the potential to reduce the production need for vehicles and shorten the preparation periods between flights. However, successful completion of the capture process alone does not mean that the vehicles will be able to fly again immediately; The condition of engines, thermal protection systems and other components also needs to be examined.
One of the main technical challenges facing SpaceX will be whether Starship can withstand the high temperatures it is exposed to during re-entry into the atmosphere and then perform a precision landing. In addition, recovering two vehicles on the same mission requires the launch infrastructure and flight control systems to operate simultaneously. According to Musk’s statements, the company will try to achieve this goal next month and in case of failure, it will continue its work with subsequent flights. Although the fact that tasks such as orbital flight and satellite docking were carried out in previous tests shows technical progress, the return, capture and re-flight processes must also be completed reliably for a fully reusable Starship system.