Source: Wall Street News

Have humans traveled beyond the stars, and the goal of landing on Mars has gone even further?

At around 21.25 Beijing time on March 14, Musk's SpaceX (Space Exploration Technology Company) successfully launched the “Starship” at its Starship base and successfully reached space, completing the third critical test flight of the rocket.

People cheered and cheered. After the rocket was launched, Musk posted a post announcing, “The Starship has reached orbital speed!” , National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) Director Bill Nelson congratulated SpaceX on its “successful test flight!”

Although the final test results did not fully meet expectations, compared with the previous two test launches, the rocket's performance has improved. The Starship not only flew farther and longer, but also successfully completed more “milestone” test missions, one step further from SpaceX's goal of sending people to the Moon and Mars.

Thanks to the rapid development of Starship, SpaceX's valuation is rising like crazy. According to a report in December last year, SpaceX's latest valuation reached 180 billion US dollars (about 1294 billion yuan), second only to ByteDance among unicorn companies in the world.

The third test flight took longer than the previous two

Over the past year, SpaceX has conducted two Starship test flights, one in April and the other in November. Unfortunately, both test launches ended in rocket explosions. For example, when it first flew in April last year, the rocket exploded a few minutes after lift-off.

After careful evaluation of these initial tests, the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) approved SpaceX's third test launch on Wednesday, which is the FAA's affirmation of SpaceX's technical and design improvements.

During this test flight, the Starship's flight continued for about an hour. The downside between the US and China is that the Starship did not land on the surface of the Indian Ocean as originally planned. In the final phase of the test, when it flew over the Indian Ocean, it lost ground, ending this test flight mission early.

Also, based on the second test flight, the third test flight will test more targets, such as opening/closing the hatch in space, demonstrating fuel transfer during flight, and reigniting the Raptor engine for the first time in space. In space missions, fuel transfer is a key technology; for example, to Mars, it may require refueling or fuel blending during the flight.

The long-term goal of the Starship project is to develop a rocket that can be used multiple times to reduce the cost of space travel and send humans to the Moon, Mars, and even farther space destinations, and realize the long-term vision of human survival on other planets.

Although the final test flight results did not fully meet expectations, this test flight provided valuable data and experience for SpaceX. SpaceX will continue to analyze the results of this test flight to optimize the rocket design and improve the rocket's performance and reliability. For example, after the first flight failed in April 2023, SpaceX made more than 1,000 modifications to the “Starship”.

Furthermore, there were no personnel on board this test flight. SpaceX's senior leaders previously stressed that before a starship carries any crew, it is necessary to conduct hundreds of flight tests for the Starship mission.

Because manned missions such as sending humans to Mars require extremely high rocket system performance and reliability, any minor technical flaw may cause the mission to fail or pose a serious threat to crew safety. Therefore, SpaceX plans to accumulate experience through a large number of unmanned test flights and continuously optimize the design. Until the system meets sufficient safety and reliability standards, it will not consider carrying out manned missions.

The size of the Starship is amazing

Starship is the tallest and most powerful rocket ever launched. The Starship system consists of two parts: the Starship spacecraft itself and an “overweight” booster.

Starship spacecraft are the upper part of the system and are used to transport humans and cargo to Earth's orbit, the Moon, Mars, etc. It is a fully reusable spacecraft that can return to Earth after completing its mission and launch again after inspection and maintenance, which can greatly reduce the cost of space travel.

The “overweight” booster is the first stage booster in the Starship system. It is responsible for providing sufficient thrust to launch the Starship spacecraft into space at the beginning of launch. The “overweight” booster will be one of the most powerful rocket boosters ever, and it can also be reused to further reduce launch costs.

In terms of size, the Starship's overall cross section is quite wide; its diameter is about 30 feet (about 9.1 meters). Furthermore, the starship is 400 feet (about 121 meters) tall, making it the tallest rocket ever, breaking the previous NASA (NASA) record for the 110.6 meter high for the Saturn 5 rocket used in the Apollo Moon mission. The height and width of the starship provided enough space to carry a large number of people and objects to space, and also provided sufficient storage space for the rocket's fuel and oxidants.

In terms of thrust, the reason why Starship is considered the most powerful rocket is not only because of its huge size, but also because it has unprecedented thrust. The “overweight” booster is equipped with 33 Raptor engines, fueled by liquid methane and liquid oxygen. Together, these Raptor engines generated 16.7 million pounds (about 7456.5 tons) of thrust, which is almost double the thrust of NASA's SLS rocket, and also in line with SpaceX's goal of sending heavy objects to Mars.

The Starship spacecraft is equipped with six Raptor engines, which are divided into two groups according to different flight environments:

1) Three Raptor engines are used in the Earth's atmosphere: When a starship is launched or returned to Earth to land, precise thrust control is required within the atmosphere to ensure safe and accurate flight. These engines can adapt to the effects of changes in atmospheric density and effectively control the lift and lateral movement of the rocket.

2) Three Raptor engines are used in a vacuum environment: When the starship reaches the space environment outside the Earth's atmosphere, these engines will be activated for long-distance space navigation, including missions to the Moon, Mars, or other deep space destinations. The three Raptor engines have different vent designs to optimize performance in vacuum and provide efficient thrust output.

This design allows the Starship spacecraft to use the most suitable engines in different flight stages and environments, thereby improving the efficiency and reliability of the entire system.

For a complete launch, the entire Starship system requires more than 10 million pounds (about 4535.9 tons) of fuel. Starship demand for large amounts of fuel is one of the challenges facing space missions.

The Starship's record size and powerful thrust mark a major leap forward in human space exploration capabilities. As SpaceX continues to move forward, the world is closely watching how the space exploration company will advance its ambitious space exploration program, and is looking forward to more achievements in future Starship projects.

Sorting out the test flight timeline

The overall process of the third test flight is that after the starship takes off, the “overweight” propeller needs to be separated from the Starship spacecraft. Afterwards, the “overweight” propeller will try to land on the surface of the water, and the Starship will continue to carry out a series of new tests and eventually fall into the Indian Ocean under control. According to the official schedule, assuming everything goes well, the entire process will take around 64 minutes.

At around 21.25 Beijing time, the Starship was ignited and launched.

At 21.25, the Starship rocket's “overweight” booster and the Starship spacecraft itself were successfully separated. The “overweight” booster is scheduled to return to the ground to try to land on the surface of the water, while the Starship spacecraft continues its mission.

At 21.33, the Starship spacecraft's 6 Raptor engines were successfully turned off, and the spacecraft entered the gliding phase. It is expected that the engines will restart at 22.05.

At 21.49, SpaceX announced that the Starship spacecraft's fuel transfer demonstration was successfully completed.

At 21.53, the process of opening/closing the Starship spacecraft hatch was successfully completed.

According to the procedure, the next step is to restart the engine (22:05) and return the Starship to the atmosphere (22.14). However, according to SpaceX, the 22.05 engine reignition process may have been skipped; in any case, the Starship will now embark on its way to the Indian Ocean.

At 22:28, SpaceX said that it had lost its signal with the Starship spacecraft, confirmed that it had lost contact with the spacecraft, and today's test flight could no longer carry out the final step of the landing process in the Indian Ocean.

editor/tolk