SpaceX Targets Monday for Starship Flight 8

According to the FAA’s current operations plan advisory, the launch window for the eighth test flight of Starship—the largest rocket to ever fly—opens Monday at 6:30 p.m. EST. SpaceX confirmed that in an update Thursday. The company had previously been aiming to fly Friday.

Flight 8 will include a few repeat objectives, such as the return of Starship’s Super Heavy booster to the launchpad—achieved using a pair of metal chopstick arms attached to a tower the company refers to as Mechazilla—and an in-orbit engine relight. If the booster catch is aborted, Super Heavy will splash down nearby as it did on Flight 6. Both Starship stages will fly the same trajectory as previous missions.

But the flight will also attempt some new feats, including Starship’s first payload deployment—four Starlink simulators that are expected to break up in the atmosphere—and a series of experiments designed to prepare for an attempt to catch Starship itself. Those include the removal of some heat tiles, the installation of new ones with different materials, and a reentry profile intended to test the limits of the rocket’s flaps.

SpaceX earlier this week said it was working with the FAA on a license authorization that would enable Flight 8. On the previous mission, Starship exploded in midair and diverted flights in the Caribbean, prompting the FAA to ground it. SpaceX traced the root cause to a “harmonic response several times stronger in flight than had been seen during testing.” That caused stress on the propulsion system which created fuel leaks, sparking a fire.

Following Flight 7, SpaceX said it performed additional static fire testing and made upgrades to Starship that make it more resilient to fuel leakage.

“SpaceX led the investigation efforts with oversight from the FAA and participation from NASA, the National Transportation Safety Board, and the U.S. Space Force,” the company said Monday. “SpaceX is working with the FAA to either close the mishap investigation or receive a flight safety determination.”

Preparations for Flight 8 come as the FAA is reportedly lining up a deal for Starlink—which SpaceX owns—to take over a 15-year, $2 billion contract that Verizon has to upgrade the agency’s communications systems. The agency said it had been considering a Starlink trial “since the prior administration” and is rolling out terminals at three locations.

SpaceX CEO Elon Musk said this week in a post on X, which he also owns, that Verizon’s system is “not working” and “putting air travelers at risk,” without backing up those claims. Musk’s involvement has sparked concerns about a conflict of interest, given the FAA’s oversight of SpaceX.

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