The Starship, the new generation rocket with which SpaceX hopes to carry out more ambitious space missions, took off this Thursday from a base in Texas, United States, for its fourth test flight, resulting in its most successful flight ever.
The flight lasted about an hour and ended with a landing in the Indian Ocean, as planned.
In this case, SpaceX no longer intended to complete a re-entry of the Starship into the atmosphere, and the rocket was not expected to land on dry land or a sea platform.
About 49 minutes after the start of the flight, the Starship began its re-entry into the Earth's atmosphere and, after about an hour and six minutes of flight, it successfully completed its first landing and landed in the Indian Ocean, to great applause.
In addition, the company also managed to make a successful landing of the Super Heavy booster (the underside of the space vehicle) in the Gulf of Mexico, seven minutes and 20 seconds after launch.
Elon Musk, founder and CEO of SpaceX, called today's test flight an “epic achievement”.
The launch was broadcast live on the X social network.
The unmanned spacecraft is classified as a super-heavy launch vehicle and is praised as the largest and most powerful rocket ever built. The rocket's ultimate goal is to transport astronauts between Earth, the Moon and even Mars.
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