SpaceX test-fired the higher stage of its seventh Starship megarocket once more not too long ago, this time practising for an in-space engine burn.
The firm ignited all six of the Flight 7 Starship spacecraft’s Raptor engines for about 10 seconds on a take a look at stand at its Starbase facility in South Texas on Sunday (Dec. 15).
SpaceX introduced that necessary prelaunch take a look at by way of X that very same day. And at the moment (Dec. 17), in one other X put up, the corporate revealed that it has performed one other static hearth with that very same car — a trial of a fairly completely different type.
“Single-engine static hearth demonstrating a flight-like startup for an in-space burn,” SpaceX wrote within the put up, which featured two movies of the almost two-minute-long burn.
The firm has additionally static-fired Flight 7’s Super Heavy first-stage booster, conducting that 33-engine take a look at at Starbase final week.
Related: What’s subsequent for SpaceX’s Starship after its profitable sixth take a look at flight?
SpaceX is creating Starship to assist humanity colonize the moon and Mars, and carry out quite a lot of different spaceflight duties (equivalent to finishing the meeting of its Starlink broadband megaconstellation).
The absolutely reusable, stainless-steel car is the most important and strongest rocket ever constructed; Starship stands about 400 toes (122 meters) tall when stacked.
Starship has launched on six take a look at flights thus far, in April and November of 2023 and March, June, October and November of this 12 months. The car has carried out very properly; on the latest three flights, for instance, each phases made it to area and survived the journey again down by Earth’s ambiance in a single piece.
SpaceX has not but introduced a goal launch date for Flight 7, however an electronic mail despatched by NASA to the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration means that the corporate is eyeing Jan. 11. (NASA intends to look at the upcoming flight utilizing a Gulfstream V jet, in keeping with that electronic mail.)
