Elon Musk’s Starship rocket completed its flight without exploding for the first time and returned to Earth

This Thursday, SpaceX achieved the successful launch of its huge and powerful Starship from Texas, managing to return both stages of the ship to Earth in a controlled manner. path for the United States to return to the Moon and reach Mars.

Takeoff occurred around 7:50 local time (1250 GMT), and the Super Heavy launch vehicle arrived about six minutes later in the Gulf of Mexico waters off Boca Chica after it separated from the capsule.

Likewise, Elon Musk’s company scores a victory today with the controlled return of a Starship capsule just over an hour after takeoff that landed in the Indian Ocean.

“Dressing confirmed! Congratulations to the entire SpaceX team on the exciting fourth flight test of Starship!” the company noted on its X account.

Musk also welcomed today’s test flight on his social media and mentioned the loss of “many” parts and damage to another.

Today marks the fourth test flight of Starship, the world’s largest and most powerful spacecraft on its quest to reach outer space.

Two initial tests conducted in 2023 failed to achieve their goals. In the first of them, the ship exploded a few minutes after takeoff, and in the second, the two parts did not separate, and controllers activated an emergency system that deliberately caused the rocket to explode.

The company insisted Thursday that the flights were all training flights and stressed progress had been made on each one.

On this fourth flight, instead of achieving the planned orbit that SpaceX had taken for granted, the goal was to “demonstrate the return and reuse capability of Starship and Super Heavy,” which includes achieving a “controlled reentry” of the vehicle.

In an attempt last March, the spacecraft managed to reach the limits of the Earth’s atmosphere, but was unable to successfully complete its descent from an altitude of 160 kilometers and at a speed of 26,000 km/h. At that time, neither of the two stages was able to return to Earth.

Today’s launch, approved last Tuesday by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), sets the stage for the United States to return to the Moon and accelerate its path to Mars.

SpaceX announced additional testing this year of Starship, a vehicle designed for long-distance travel, capable of carrying crew members and large satellites, and with cost savings provided by reusability.

The American space agency NASA has chosen this device to deliver crew members of the Artemis III mission to the lunar surface, which in 2026, for the first time in more than half a century, will send astronauts from the United States to the natural satellite.

“We are one step closer to returning humanity to the Moon via Artemis and then to Mars,” NASA Administrator Bill Nelson said this Thursday on the X program, congratulating the test.

NASA astronaut Raja Chari, who attended the historic launch in Boca Chica today, stressed to EFE that this is the path to “return to the Moon.”

The flight engineer noted that he was very happy to see him after the “many meetings” that these projects require.

Just like Chari, dozens of curious people and tourists came the night before to the beach of Isla Blanca, on the island of South Padre, 1.5 kilometers from Starbase, the Mask space complex in Boca Chica, a city bordering the state of Tamaulipas ​​(Mexico).

This area has one of the best views of the launch tower, which is located outside the SpaceX complex and about 50 meters from the beach.

“We were shopping in Houston, Texas, but we found out it coincided with the launch and couldn’t miss it,” 16-year-old Shen, who came from Beijing accompanied by her family, told EFE. For Colombian Viviana, it was a “unique opportunity,” she told EFE. “I don’t mind being hot, hungry or thirsty, I don’t know if I’ll ever experience anything like that again,” he added.