The big SpaceX Starship project was underway last week as the “Booster 7,” Super Heavy rocket prototype, moved to its testing ground in South Texas on Thursday (June 23).
The Starship Rock and its Super Heavy rocket are set to test pressure and possibly, with a fire test located near Boca Chica that could push its fuel-burning capacity from time to time, according to Ars Technica.
If it survives, “not at all a guarantee of Raptor 2 engine upgrade,” the upgrade could bring Starship to a test flight around July, the report added on Friday (June 24).
SpaceX’s Starship program includes a first-level booster, a Super Heavy, and a 165-meter (50-meter) high-speed car called a Starship. Both vehicles are designed to be entirely usable. When fully stocked, Starship and Super Heavy stand at 395 feet (120 m), making them the tallest rocket in the world.
SpaceX is finally planning to use the program to take people and goods to the NASA moon, then target Mars and other spacecraft, but Starship has a few high-altitude spacecraft under its belt so far.
Those tests all took place in a group between August 2020 and May 2021; since then, SpaceX has been waiting for the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to complete an environmental test to determine the potential for space.
That process has just been wrapped up in recent weeks, with 75 steps needed for SpaceX to take over to continue operating at Boca Chica. (The FAA has repeatedly delayed the deadline, saying it should have discussed the findings with other agencies and filtered thousands of public comments submitted after the release of the revised version in September 2021.)
But even now, FAA accreditation is not a guarantee. SpaceX still needs to get a launch license, pending an agency to determine how it handled the remaining items in the environmental test.
