JAKARTA - SpaceX has successfully placed the third generation Starlink satellite or Starlink V3 for the first time. However, the 13th flight test of the Starship was not smooth because the Super Heavy booster failed again in a landing simulation in the Gulf of Mexico.
TechCrunch, quoted Saturday, July 25, reported that the launch on Friday used the latest version of the Starship prototype. The Starlink V3 satellite was successfully released, but the booster was unable to complete the simulated landing maneuver as planned.
The booster is the main propellant of the rocket during the initial phase of launch. In the Starship system, this part is called Super Heavy.
This is the second problem with the Super Heavy booster in the V3 version of the Starship. In May, during the first flight of the Starship V3, SpaceX also experienced a failure on the Super Heavy when the booster separated from the rocket's upper stage.
In the latest launch, SpaceX got better results on the Starship upper stage. After releasing the Starlink satellite, the upper stage successfully carried out a landing simulation.
The launch comes a little more than a week after SpaceX aborted the 13th Starship launch attempt. At the time, the mission had to be stopped immediately after the engine ignited because a number of rocket engines failed to work.
SpaceX said it had replaced six engines before Friday's flight to fix the problem.
At Friday's launch, the Super Heavy booster went further in its flight plan. However, the booster was unable to ignite all the engines needed for the landing simulation burn.
The booster then exploded after hitting the water surface faster than expected.
This test was also the first Starship launch since SpaceX went public in June through the largest initial public offering (IPO) in history.
The failure of the booster also tests the development approach of Starship, which SpaceX often refers to as "fly, fail, fix". This approach is common in rocket tests, but is now read by investors through stock movements.
SpaceX shares fell last week a day after the launch cancellation. The decline was part of a larger trend since the IPO. The company's share price fell from a high of more than $200 per share to $115 at Friday's close.
In after-hours trading, SpaceX shares were down 2 percent after the booster failure, before paring some of their losses.
Despite the booster failure, the upper stage of the Starship V3 showed progress. At the first V3 launch last May, the upper stage lost one rocket engine. This time, the problem did not occur.
Starship sped up without major obstacles until it managed to release a new Starlink satellite. The upper stage, which SpaceX calls the Ship, was also able to survive when it re-entered the atmosphere.
About an hour after taking off, the Ship performed a landing simulation in the Indian Ocean.
Unlike previous Starship missions, the Ship did not explode when it rolled into the water. The craft instead floated, giving SpaceX the opportunity to use a drone to inspect the heat shield tiles on its underside.
In this test, Starship has not reached Earth orbit so that the Starlink V3 satellite that was released then burned in the atmosphere about 20 minutes after placement.
However, SpaceX was still able to communicate with all of the satellites while they were still in space. TechCrunch said Starlink was the only part of SpaceX's business that was profitable.
Starlink V3 is important for SpaceX's business calculations. The new satellite is said to be more capable and can improve the economics of a space internet network that requires large capital.
SpaceX said the launch of 60 Starlink V3 satellites with Starship has the potential to increase the downlink capacity by up to 20 times compared to satellites flown with a single Falcon 9.
Downlink is the capacity to send data from a satellite to users on Earth. In the satellite internet business, this capacity determines how large a service can serve users.
However, the benefits are not necessarily full if SpaceX still has to sacrifice the Super Heavy booster, instead of using it again.
In its S-1 filing, SpaceX said without a fully reusable Starship, Starlink development "would be slower and more expensive."
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