SpaceX Ships Starship Rocket To Launch Pad Ahead Of Potential Fiery Tests

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After a static fire of the Super Heavy booster's engines last week, SpaceX shipped the rocket back to the launch site for more preflight testing. The firm's latest rocket test saw several of the booster's engines shut down, indicating that problems persist on the rocket that is slated to make its second orbital test flight attempt soon. The booster, which measures 226 feet tall without the second stage Starship stacked on top, is the heart of the Starship rocket system. Even without the Starship's second stage, it is one of the largest rockets in the world and only the second rocket in human history to use dozens of engines to generate millions of pounds of thrust.

Starship is crucial to SpaceX's future since the firm needs to earn more revenue and because NASA has contracted the rocket to land the first astronauts on the Moon since the Apollo program. NASA's Artemis program, which kicked off last year, plans to land the first astronauts under the Artemis 3 mission, and SpaceX's second-stage Starship spacecraft is the lander of choice for this mission. The mission profile for the lunar landing will see the astronauts leave Earth on NASA's Orion capsule and enter Starship either through docking with NASA's Gateway space station or with SpaceX's spaceship directly.

A recent NASA press conference for the Artemis 2 mission, planned to take off in November, shed light on the space agency's partnership with SpaceX. At the event, the space agency's associate administrator for the exploration systems development directorate, Mr. Jim Free, stressed that SpaceX has to launch Starship multiple