SpaceX is making a second attempt to launch the Starship system for its first orbital test flight after Monday’s aborted nine minutes ahead of schedule due to a valve problem. This is the first time the Starship system, consisting of two stages with a total of 39 engines, will be fully operational. Both components must end up in the ocean and will NOT be recovered.

15.58: SpaceX says the rocket appears to be fine and the launch is scheduled for 4:28 p.m., as scheduled.

The launch is scheduled for 8:28 (16:28 Romanian time) from the base in Boca Chica (Texas), and the Starship should return to Earth at 9:58 (17:58 Romanian time).

The system consists of two parts: the Starship is the spacecraft/upper stage (with six Raptor engines) and the Super Heavy is the booster/main stage with 33 Raptor engines needed to escape Earth’s gravity.

Less than 3 minutes after launch, the Super Heavy segment should separate from the Starship, and the Super Heavy should fly another six minutes before making a controlled descent into the waters of the Gulf of Mexico, 32 km from Boca Chica.

Starship will continue its ascent after detaching from the Super Heavy, but will NOT make a full orbit around the Earth, but will reach a maximum altitude of 234 km, and then should return safely to the ocean, somewhere in the area of ​​the Hawaiian Islands (225 km from Oahu, Hawaii). Starship will re-enter the atmosphere 77 minutes after launch and should land in the ocean 90 minutes later. Starship will reach a maximum speed of 26,000 km/h.

Future versions of this rocket – more powerful and better – should deliver men to the moon after 2025 and to Mars, probably after 2035.

The rocket was fueled with liquid methane (CH4) and liquid oxygen (O2). Methane is the fuel and oxygen acts as an oxidizer, the substance that allows the fuel to burn. The combination is called “metalox”.

The main stage of SuperHeavy is 70 meters high and Starship is 50 meters high. The height of the entire system is 120 meters. For comparison, NASA’s SLS rocket is 98 meters tall, and the Apollo lunar program’s Saturn V rocket was 111 meters tall.

None of the components will be recovered during this mission, but SpaceX wants to prove that the Super Heavy, a stage with 33 Raptor engines, can make a soft landing and last a few seconds before falling into the ocean. The key moment will be when the two components separate, almost three minutes after launch. The question will also be whether the Starship can successfully withstand the high temperatures during reentry.

The main idea is to gather data to make future prototypes better, especially since in future missions the idea is to restore them.

In the future, the main stage is planned to return near the launch tower, which will be equipped with two brackets to immobilize the superheavy stage.

Until now, the components of the system were tested separately: some successfully returned to the ground, other prototypes spectacularly exploded. Starship conducted a suborbital test at an altitude of up to 10 km.

Elon Musk said on Sunday that the test was “very risky”. “It’s about the first flight of a huge, very complex rocket.”

Musk announced the name Starship in September 2018, talking about the structure of the system with which, in the distant future, in more powerful versions of the rocket, people will be able to reach Mars. Five years ago, the future rocket was known as the Big Falcon Rocket (BFR).