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FAA signs off on SpaceX Starship safety, still awaits environmental update

SpaceX is still waiting on the results of an updated environmental impact of its new Starship and Super Heavy rocket, but the Federal Aviation Administration has signed off on the safety of the massive vehicle after its initial orbital launch attempt in April ended with it exploding over the Gulf of Mexico.

The April 20 launch saw the rocket produce more than 15 million pounds of thrust on liftoff that destroyed much of the launch pad at SpaceX’s Boca Chica, Texas, facility called Starbase. And while it did make it several minutes into flight, the second stage Starship was not able to separate from the Super Heavy booster, and teams attempted to activate its flight termination system, but the rocket did not explode immediately on command.

The orbital launch attempt was labeled a “mishap” by the FAA and the craft was grounded during a SpaceX-led investigation. The FAA performed its final review of the investigation in August officially closing the incident in September, but the final report listed “63 corrective actions SpaceX must take to prevent mishap reoccurrence.”

On Tuesday, the FAA said it had completed the safety review portion of the next launch license evaluation.

“A safety review is focused on issues that affect public health and safety of property,” the FAA stated in a press release. “It consists of evaluating the applicant’s safety organization, system safety processes, flight safety analysis, and quantitative risk criteria for launch, reentry, and vehicle disposal.”

But no license will be granted until the completion of the FAA’s environmental review, which it’s doing with the help of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to complete an updated assessment under the Endangered Species Act, the FAA stated.

Vehicle is ready for the second test flight of a fully integrated Starship, pending regulatory approval pic.twitter.com/9tC4yKecmw

— SpaceX (@SpaceX) October 25, 2023

Meanwhile, SpaceX has prepped its next rocket at Starbase. going through a dress rehearsal last week during which teams loaded the combined spacecraft with more than 10 million pounds of propellant.

“Vehicle is ready for the second test flight of a fully integrated Starship, pending regulatory approval,” SpaceX posted to X.

The April 20 flight was a one-time approval from the FAA, and more Starship flights will require SpaceX to submit to the FAA’s satisfaction that it has addressed all 63 corrective actions. SpaceX then has to receive “a license modification from the FAA that addresses all safety, environmental and other applicable regulatory requirements prior to the next Starship launch.”

SpaceX stacks another Starship and Super Heavy for 1st time since launch explosion

If it does make orbit on an eventual second test flight, it would become the most powerful rocket ever to do so, besting the 8.8. million pounds of thrust achieved by NASA’s Space Launch System rocket on the Artemis I mission to send the Orion spacecraft to the moon last fall.

The flight plan still calls for it to reach space, and do about 2/3 an orbit around Earth. The Super Heavy booster is slated for a hard landing in the Gulf of Mexico after separation while Starship is slated for a hard water landing near Hawaii. The system, though, is designed to be fully reusable with both booster and Starship able to make vertical landings.

NASA is waiting on SpaceX’s Starship so it can move forward with the human landing aspect of its future Artemis missions. Artemis III currently slated for as early as December 2025 aims to return humans, including the first woman, to the lunar surface for the first time since the end of the Apollo program in 1972.

SpaceX Starship delays could shift Artemis III away from moon landing, official says

A version of Starship won the contract to be NASA’s first Human Landing System for that Artemis III mission, designed to meet up with Orion in orbit around the moon and then fly two astronauts down to the moon’s south pole and return them back to Orion.

SpaceX has to manage a successful uncrewed moon landing with Starship before NASA will let humans on board as well.

SpaceX plans to fly dozens if not more than 100 operational launches of Starship before it lets any humans on board, as it too has at least three commercial human spaceflight missions already lined up in addition to the NASA mission.

Test flights will continue from Texas, but SpaceX is also building out a Starship launch tower at Kennedy Space Center for when it begins operational flights.