Starship Flight 10 splashdown of the STARSHIP (upper stage) within ~3 meters from its intended flight target, August 26, 2025 (SpaceX)
For SpaceX and its ambitious Starship program, the 10th time is the charm. It could not have come too soon!
SpaceX, known for its “fail fast” test and development philosophy, had racked up nine failed test flights prior to its 10th. The Starship development program has had some incredible partial successes – remember the “Chop Stick” recovery of Starship’s “Super Heavy” main booster?
SpaceX's Super Heavy booster burns 13 of its 33 engines as it returns to its launch pad to be caught by mechanical arms on Oct. 13, 2024. (SpaceX)
Starship’s aggressive development program has come at a tremendous cost. SpaceX is burning through over $1.5 billion every year. Since the program’s inception, SpaceX has invested nearly $7.5 billion of its own money, and a total program cost of $10 billion when NASA and US DoD investments are included. Starship is expected to begin commercial launches in 2026 or early 2027, following an additional $1.5 billion to $2.5 billion in investment.
The bottom line to reach commercial flights will be a roughly $13 billion development to create the world’s most powerful rocket launch system. By comparison, the Planetary Society estimates that the Apollo space program cost nearly $318 billion in 2025 dollars. To SpaceX’s credit, their fail-fast development methodology, combined with massive reuse of technology and components such as the Raptor Rocket Engine, allows a nearly 25 times improvement in test and development costs vs the Apollo Program. The net result (see the table) is a nearly 200 times reduction in the cost to place a kilogram of payload into LEO vs SpaceX's own Falcon 9 and ~4200 x improvement over the US Space Shuttle system.
SpaceX STARSHIP impact on the cost to a kilogram of payload into LEO (SpaceX)
The success of Flight 10 could not have come fast enough ...
The future of both exploration and colonization of the inner solar system is directly tied to the success of the SpaceX Starship program.
Failure would set the US and our Allies back at least a decade. By way of example, US space programs require Starship to be successful, including:
Artemis program to have a permanent manned presence on the moon by 2030 and build out the so-called “CisLunar economy” to harvest resources from the moon. Learn more the cislunar economy from my lecture at the Satellite Innovation conference “Satellite Innovation for Cislunar Infrastructure”HERE
A series of Missions to Mars, including manned missions not long after Artemis
Final build out and replacement of SpaceX Starlink satellite constellation from the current 8094 in orbit to over 13,000 planned. Starship will greatly improve launch economics and satellite replacement for Starlink
The build-out and maintenance of the US Golden Dome space-based missile defense system, both weapons (kinetic interceptors and direct energy weapons), and the Proliferated Warfighter Space Architecture (PWSA). The PWSA is the constellation of 100s communications and reconnaissance/intelligence satellites to detect, track, assess threats, and if necessary intercept enemy ballistic, hypersonic, and cruise missile attacks.
Without the High lift to LEO orbit capacity and the flow cost per Kg placed in orbit that Starship brings, none of these programs are financially and in some cases technically feasible.
Let’s briefly look at the components that make up Starship
Starship- A few technical details:
Starship launch vehicle (SpaceX)
Starship: a two-stage, completely reusable launch system consisting of the SUPER HEAVY Booster powered by 33 Raptor engines and the STARSHIP powered by 6 Raptor Engines
Raptor Engines: reusable methane-oxygen staged-combustion engines whith 2x the thrust of SpaceX Merlin engines used on current SpaceX Falcon launch. Apollo Saturn 5 launch vehicles used 5x F-1 engines generating 33 Million Newtons (MN) of Thrust. Starship uses 33 x Raptor engines, generating 89 MN of thrust. Starship is 3x more powerful than Saturn 5 – and completely reusable.
Dimensions: 123 meters ( 403 feet) height and 9 meters (27 feet) in diameter
Payload: 150 metric tons reusable launch and 250 metric tons expendable launch in Low Earth Orbit ( LEO) ~1000 km orbit height - as a comparison, SpaceX Falcon Super Heavy, the largest current SpaceX launch vehicle, can only launch 63.8 Metric Tons
You can find out more about Starship, its launch facilities (Star base), production (Star Factory), and payload delivery HERE. It is absolutely worth a look!
Let’s talk about his incredible mission ...
STARSHIP FLIGHT 10:
Up to Flight 10, Starship had a series of failures ranging from loss of control communications to fuel system/thruster failures to 2nd stage separation failures. Flight 10 was the first complete end-to-end for the launch system. The mission lasted just over 1 hour and 6 minutes, and rather than being caught by ‘Chop Stick” , the Super Heavy main booster made a targeted landing in the Gulf of Mexico (aka Gulf of America – if that matters to you). The Starship 2nd stage was set for a targeted landing in the Indian Ocean and nailed it ( as shown in the accompanying graphic)
Starship Flight 10 Mission Profile (SpaceX)
Here is an abridged chronology of the mission
Starship’s 33 Raptor engines ignite and liftoff August 26, 2025, at 6:30 p.m. US Central time from Starbase Texas
After successful ascent over the Gulf of Mexico, the 2nd stage (upper stage) STARSHIP payload separates from the Super Heavy 1st stage booster igniting its 6 Raptor engines in a “hot-staged” separation maneuver
The Super Heavy booster performs a “flip and back burn” maneuver, descends to a predetermined point in the Gulf of Mexico, executes its landing burn, hovering over the water until engine cut for a controlled splashdown.
The STARSHIP upper stage completes its final ascent burn and begins to coast.
8 dummy Starlink satellites successfully test the payload delivery system
The STARSHIP upper stage relights its Raptor engines (a first-time event due to earlier launch failures) to start reentry.
At this point, the heatshield and flap control structure was subjected to the heat of reentry. This was another critical stage in the mission which could have led to mission failure… there were no issues!
Finally, as SpaceX describers:
“Using its four flaps for control, the spacecraft arrived at its splashdown point in the Indian Ocean, successfully executed a landing flip, and completed the flight test with a landing burn and soft splashdown.”
You can discover more details about Starship Flight 10 at the SpaceX website HERE
So what's next after Flight 10’s success?
Flight 11 will continue the Starship V2 development program and be followed in a 2-month cadence by additional V2 test launches leading to the production start of V3 commercial design
Starship V3 a slightly larger version of V2 with a series of improvements for the V2 test program an begin commercial service later this year
In 2026, a Starship V3 is slated for the first of a series of unmanned Mars test flights
In 2027, Starship will begin the first of a series of manned Lunar missions for the Artemis lunar program
Finally, V3 will be joined by Starship V4, with a total of 42 Raptor engines and an additional 22 meters of height - this massive launch vehicle will be the workhorse vehicle for the 2030s and beyond
A more detailed look at future SpaceX Starship Mission can be found at Space.com HERE
That’s a wrap for this week …
Up next - Part 1 of an in-depth look into space-based missile defense and the Golden Dome program. The US and possibly some of our Allies are about to commit $500 billion to this program over the next 10 years. As a taxpaying citizen or an ally, maybe wise how your tax dollars a being spent - Wisely I hope!
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