Starship reaches orbit ahead of ship catch bid as booster ends in explosive splashdown
SpaceX’s 15th Starship flight put the upper stage into orbit and deployed 26 Starlink satellites. The Super Heavy booster, however, did not return to the launch tower as planned. The mission was SpaceX’s most ambitious Starship test so far, aimed at showing the system can be fully reused by recovering both stages. Only half of that goal was in reach after the booster diverted to a splashdown in the Gulf.
Starship lifted off from Starbase, Texas, at 4:47 p.m. CST on Friday, Nov. 13 (5:47 p.m. EST, 2247 UTC).
Booster diverts from the catch
The flight plan called for Super Heavy Booster 22 to come back to pad 2 at Starbase about 6.5 minutes after liftoff. Instead, the booster aborted its approach and headed for a splashdown offshore. Video showed the vehicle exploding and dropping out of view. It then appeared to rise back out of the water as its remaining propellants burned off.
SpaceX commentator Dan Huot explained the abort in an update about 16.5 hours into the mission. He said the booster’s guidance, navigation and control system detected that the vehicle was not where it needed to be to proceed with a tower catch. It then carried out an automated abort and flew to the offshore splashdown zone. Huot added that the system worked as designed. He also corrected an earlier comment on the webcast, saying the failure to return was not a guidance, navigation and control problem. The source does not say why the booster was out of position.
Three earlier boosters were caught by the launch tower. The Version 3 Super Heavy has yet to make a successful return.
Ship 42 enters a long coast
The upper stage, Ship 42, deployed 26 Version 3 Starlink satellites. It then began a coast phase of up to 14 orbits. If all systems stay healthy, the ship is scheduled to return to the launch site about 22.5 hours after liftoff, at roughly 3:20 p.m. CST (4:20 p.m. EST, 2120 UTC). Its path would take it over Mexico and South Texas.
SpaceX has contingency plans to end the flight early. If there is any doubt about the safety of a landing attempt at Starbase, the ship can instead splash down off Hawaii or Chile.
The source was written before the ship’s return, so the outcome of that attempt is not covered here.
Source: spaceflightnow.com
