Well folks, it’s time for Starship IFT-6! Another booster RTLS and chopsticks catch attempt, as well as the first in-space Raptor relight attempt.
| Scheduled for (UTC) | 2024-11-19 22:00 |
|---|---|
| Scheduled for (local) | 2024-11-19 16:00 (CDT) |
| Launch Window (UTC) | 2024-11-19 22:00 to 2024-11-19 22:30 (30 minutes) |
| Launch site | Pad A, SpaceX Starbase, TX, USA. |
| Booster | B13 |
| Ship | S31 |
| Booster landing | Chopsticks catch at Pad A or soft water landing in Gulf of Mexico |
| Ship landing | Indian Ocean |
Webcasts
| Stream | Link |
|---|---|
| Space Affairs | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ucEu075bgx0 |
| Everyday Astronaut | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DjDFirLcQDM |
| Spaceflight Now | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dtmvbQDou4I |
| NASASpaceflight | Stakeout stream, launch stream |
| LabPadre | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QdGJ5p4PP1M |
| The Launch Pad | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qSxOuFrqyks |
| VideoFromSpace | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l7cM90N-CDc |
| SpaceX | https://x.com/SpaceX/status/1857841326542434339 |
| The Space Devs | https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XpyWcPuepV8 |
Stats
Sourced from NextSpaceflight and r/SpaceX:
☑️ 4th Starship Full Stack launch this year
☑️ 6th Starship Full Stack launch overall
☑️ 119th SpaceX launch this year
☑️ 431st SpaceX launch overall (including Starship hops)
☑️ 4th launch from Pad A this year
☑️ 37 days, 9:35:00 turnaround for this pad
Mission Details 🚀
- SpaceX website (current): Starship’s Sixth Flight Test
The objectives for Starship Flight 6 are:
- Restart of Raptor engines in vacuum.
- Daylight landing of the ship.
- Higher peak heating (steeper) reentry.
- Faster/harder booster catch.
There are thousands of small design changes also being tested.
Link to Starship Dev thread
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“Booster offshore divert.” No booster catch today.
Booster landing burn and splashdown confirmed.
Ship landing burn and splashdown confirmed!
Raptor startup and shutdown confirmed. Pretty short burn, maybe only 5 to 10 seconds.
Ship engine cutoff confirmed. Ship FTS has safed, nominal orbit insertion.
Raptor in-space relight demo scheduled for T+37:46.
MECO, hot staging, stage separation, and boostback burn startup!
Tower is go for catch.
Liftoff!
S31 contains a single banana as a zero-g indicator and dummy payload. Also served as a test run for approving Starship payloads with the FAA. The banana will not be deployed.
Hosted webcast is back for in-space raptor relight test.
Hot stage ring jettison confirmed.
Engine chill, range safety is go.
Huh interesting, they’re planning on pitching the ship nose-down during final descent to test the limits of flap control.
Tower and launch mount venting has started.
Starship is transonic.
Starship has passed through Max-Q.
Slight heating visible on one of the forward flaps.