Starship has come a long way in five years
SpaceX kicked off Starship development in earnest in 2019, when the company debuted a steel test vehicle nicknamed “Starhopper” that resembled a water tower more than a rocket. Starhopper tested out landing maneuvers by making brief flights up to a few dozen meters into the air.
From there, the company moved on to testing larger scale Starship spacecraft prototypes — each with a serial number or “SN” name.
Four of those flights ended in violent explosions after attempting to land upright from high altitudes. But the company finally nailed a soft landing after a 10-kilometer (33,000-foot) test flight in May of 2021.
Since then, SpaceX has tackled far more ambitious projects — slowly working its way to launching not only the Starship spacecraft but also its gargantuan rocket booster called Super Heavy, which is required to propel the Starship toward orbit.
No Starship rocket has been carried into a stable orbit around Earth — but that’s in part because that hasn’t been the goal of any of SpaceX’s six test flights so far.
The company has been more focused on safely launching the rocket, reigniting its engines and hashing out how the vehicle will execute safe landings after returning from space.
The first launch of a Starship and Super Heavy, carried out in April 2023, ended just minutes after takeoff as the rocket’s engines did not light as expected and SpaceX had to hit the self-destruct button to keep the vehicle from veering off course.
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