The successful test flight confirms Elon Musk’s strategy

The history of the Starship has been one of failure. The rockets exploded again and again – until Sunday. SpaceX’s new spacecraft successfully performed an impressive maneuver. The propulsion rocket catapulted the spacecraft into the air and then landed accurately for the first time on the launch pad, where it was caught by gripper arms. The space capsule, the actual Starship, landed in the Indian Ocean after flying halfway around the globe. Exactly as planned.

Can an exploding rocket be celebrated as a success? Elon Musk did exactly that with the earlier versions of the Starship and regularly received malicious comments for it. But Sunday’s success shows that SpaceX’s strategy of iteratively learning from mistakes is working. Indeed, the failures of recent years have been just as significant as last Sunday’s spectacular success. And there is every reason to believe that continued progress will continue.

SpaceX is improving step by step

The Starship’s first test flight took place in April 2023. But the two parts of the rocket, the Super Heavy Booster propulsion rocket and the actual Starship, did not separate successfully. Both exploded. In the second and third attempts, either the propulsion rocket or the Starship exploded. But each time there was a clear improvement from one test flight to the next. Everything went so well on the fourth test flight in June that SpaceX dared to take the riskiest step for the fifth attempt this weekend: catching the rocket.

That’s the principle by which SpaceX develops its innovative rockets: You build a clunky prototype and launch it, expecting that the test flight will probably fail. However, you observe this failure so carefully that you can learn a lot from it. The next version of the rocket is already significantly better, and a few iterations later, all the setbacks have become major progress.

Reduce costs with reusable rockets

Using the same principle, SpaceX has already achieved something that many thought was impossible: the propulsion rockets of the Falcon rockets, the predecessor of the Starship, have been landing on the ground again for years. After a short repair they can be used again. Individual propulsion bodies have already taken off and landed more than ten times.

Due to the enormous size alone, this is an even greater challenge with the Starship. At 120 meters long, the Starship is the largest spaceship ever built. If it works, it could launch significantly more payload or people into space than any previous rocket.

In addition, SpaceX is pursuing the goal of a reusable rocket with the Starship even more consistently. The second rocket stage, the actual space capsule, should also be reusable. During the most recent test flight, they were allowed to land in a controlled manner in the ocean. But in the future, like the propulsion rocket, it should be able to return to the launch site and be picked up by the gripper arms.

A huge, fully reusable rocket would fundamentally change space travel. Because today all space missions are determined by saving as much weight as possible. SpaceX’s reusable rockets have already reduced the cost per kilogram of material transported into space. If the Starship is ready for series production, they are likely to fall significantly again.

Elon Musk’s stated goal is to use the Starship to take people to the moon and ultimately to Mars in the near future. There is still a long way to go until then. But moments like on Sunday show that we are getting closer to the big goals – step by step.