SpaceX announced that the tenth integrated test flight of the heavy launch vehicle ‘Starship’ may be launched on August 24, expected to take off from the company’s manufacturing and testing site in Starbase, Texas during the launch window. According to the ‘space’ website, flight 10 will be the fourth Starship launch in 2025 and comes at a critical stage in the spacecraft’s development. The previous three Starship flights this year ended with the loss of the upper stage, increasing pressure on the schedule to prepare the vehicle as a lunar landing unit for NASA’s Artemis 3 mission to the Moon, planned for sometime in 2027. The fully equipped Super Heavy booster and Starship upper stage stand about 120 meters (394 feet) tall. Flight 10 will carry booster 16 and ship 37, both Block 2 versions of the advanced launch vehicle, with SpaceX making incremental upgrades for each mission.

This launch follows flight 9, which launched on May 27 and ended with the upper stage breaking up in space about 45 minutes after liftoff. Less than a month later, on June 18, a static fire test at Starbase resulted in an explosion that destroyed ship 36, originally planned for flight 10, and damaged SpaceX’s testing infrastructure. After investigations, Starship flight 10 is heading to the launch pad with a new set of mission objectives. Once in space, after stage separation, Starship will deploy eight Starlink mass simulator satellites, perform a Raptor engine relight in space, and attempt a controlled landing in the Indian Ocean. Meanwhile, booster 16 will change course for a controlled landing in the Gulf of Mexico. SpaceX is developing Starship as part of Elon Musk’s vision to make human life multiplanetary by sending people to Mars.

It also forms a key element in NASA’s Artemis program to return astronauts to the Moon for long-duration missions.