SpaceX, owned by American billionaire Elon Musk, launched the eleventh flight of its Starship vehicle from the Starbase facility in Texas on Monday. This test mission aims to evaluate the reusable design’s capability to deploy satellites and eventually transport humans to the Moon and Mars.

The spacecraft consists of the upper stage Starship mounted atop the Super Heavy booster. It lifted off around 23:20 GMT from SpaceX’s Starbase facilities.

After sending the upper stage Starship into space, the Super Heavy booster returned to make a smooth landing in the Gulf of Mexico about 10 minutes after liftoff.

Gwynne Shotwell, SpaceX president, said at a conference in Paris last month: “We did everything we could think of to make the eleventh test flight successful… but as you know, no one knows what might happen, so we’ll see.”

Starship is scheduled to land NASA astronauts on the Moon by 2027.

This rocket is essential for launching the larger Starlink satellites, which play a vital role in SpaceX’s goals for broadband mobile internet, a key part of Musk’s vision to send humans and cargo to Mars.