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SpaceX’s Starship megarocket may establish its significance in 2025.
The 400-foot-tall (122 meters) Starship stands as the largest and most potent rocket system ever constructed, purposely designed to be completely and rapidly reusable. SpaceX asserts this blend of power and effectiveness will be the pivotal advancement that enables humanity to accomplish numerous spaceflight achievements — including colonizing Mars, a long-cherished aspiration of company founder and CEO Elon Musk.
This vision may crystallize over the next year or so, as Starship seems ready to make a substantial advancement in 2025.
Increasing the flight frequency
Starship has flown six times thus far — twice in 2023 and four times in 2024.
The craft has made significant advancements during these test flights, all launched from SpaceX’s Starbase facility in South Texas. In the most recent three flights, for example, both components of Starship — the Super Heavy booster and the 165-foot-tall (50 m) upper-stage spacecraft, simply called Starship or Ship — remained intact during their return through Earth’s atmosphere.
Related: What comes next for SpaceX’s Starship after its successful sixth test flight?
On Flight 5, which lifted off on Oct. 13, the launch tower at Starbase successfully captured the returning Super Heavy with its “chopstick” arms, showcasing the retrieval strategy SpaceX intends to utilize for both stages of Starship during operational launches.
Such tower captures might become relatively routine by 2025. SpaceX has submitted a request to quintuple the number of authorized Starship launches from Starbase in the upcoming year to 25 — and the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has provisionally approved this plan.
A draft environmental assessment published by the FAA in November endorses not only the 25 Starship launches from Starbase but also 50 tower captures at the site — comprised of 25 for Super Heavy and 25 for Ship. SpaceX already possesses an FAA license for the Starship Flight 7 launch, potentially scheduled for early to mid-January.
This escalation would be monumental for SpaceX, whose rocket development strategy revolves around launching, iterating, and launching again. There is every reason to believe this aim is attainable; after all, the company has conducted over 130 orbital missions in 2024, predominantly using its reliable Falcon 9 rocket.
“You don’t need to be a rocket scientist to realize that the timeline they operate within is unprecedented,” astrophysicist Ehud Behar, a professor at the Technion — Israel Institute of Technology, remarked to Space.com.
Moreover, 25 Starship missions per year is far from their ultimate target; the organization aims to keep increasing the rate in 2026 and later.
“Elon would express that, next year, he would love for us to have 25 missions a year, and within a few years, 100,” Kathy Lueders, general manager of SpaceX’s Starbase operations, mentioned in November during the National Congress of Space Activities conference organized by the Mexico Space Agency, as reported by Gizmodo. “He stated to me, ‘Kathy, I would love to lift off a couple of times a day.'”
Not all of these upcoming missions will take off from Starbase: SpaceX also intends to launch Starship from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, which currently accommodates launches of the company’s Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy rockets.
Upcoming crewed flights
SpaceX has secured several clients for Starship, primarily NASA, which has selected the megarocket to serve as the first crewed lander for its Artemis lunar exploration program.
If everything proceeds as planned, Starship’s upper stage will deliver NASA astronauts close to the moon’s south pole during the Artemis 3 mission, presently scheduled for launch in mid-2027.
This timeline has been shifted several times, most recently due to challenges with NASA’s Orion crew capsule. (The Artemis 3 plan involves astronauts departing Earth aboard Orion, utilizing NASA’s Space Launch System rocket. In lunar orbit, Orion will rendezvous with a modified Starship upper stage, which will transport the astronauts down to the moon’s surface.)
It remains uncertain if Artemis 3 will be set to fly in 2027, Behar remarked, citing NASA’s budget constraints and the inherent difficulties of crewed missions, particularly those utilizing a brand-new spaceflight system. (How many successful uncrewed Starship flights will NASA prefer to witness before allowing its astronauts to board the vehicle?)
Nonetheless, he remains optimistic that Starship will be ready to undertake less complex spaceflight functions by then.
“I believe Starship, as a satellite launcher, appears to be on course,” Behar stated. “I don’t see any rationale for why they shouldn’t maintain their schedule.”
Related: NASA’s Artemis initiative: All you need to know
Larger rocket, greater demand?
Starship will grow even larger and more formidable over time, according to SpaceX.
“With a few anticipated improvements, Starship will possess three times the thrust [at liftoff] of Saturn V, with 10,000 metric tons of thrust, along with the advantage of full reusability,” SpaceX manufacturing engineering manager Jessica Anderson stated during the live stream of Starship’s sixth test flight, which took place on Nov. 19.
“Starship 2 will be capable of transporting over 100 tons to orbit, and Starship 3 will have the capacity to lift over 200 tons to orbit,” she continued. “The capacity for mass we’re able to launch per rocket is vital for establishing a self-sustaining settlement on Mars.”
Due to Starship’s complete reusability, the spacecraft could potentially generate such thrust figures for merely $2 million to $3 million per flight, as Musk has indicated. That would be remarkably economical; SpaceX currently markets Falcon 9 missions for around $67 million.
Those projected Starship capabilities may be geared towards Mars colonization, yet the megarocket may also undertake numerous missions closer to Earth. SpaceX aims to complete the assembly of its Starlink broadband megaconstellation using Starship, and various clients will likely find ways to utilize the vehicle as well, Behar commented.
“I think we’ve recognized that if technology is developed and cost-effective, there will be applications for it,” he stated.
“People forget that space is a location; it’s not just one entity,” Behar added. “There are numerous activities possible in space, ranging from developing new materials to producing medicines. Presently, the barrier to access is exceedingly high.”
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