SpaceX’s ambitious Starship program hit another bump in the road over the weekend, as the company was forced to call off its much-anticipated tenth test flight just as propellants began flowing into the rocket’s tanks. The decision to scrub the launch, announced late Sunday at SpaceX’s Starbase facility in southern Texas, came after engineers detected a ground-side liquid oxygen leak. This latest setback comes after a string of explosive test failures and mounting pressure to deliver on promises that could reshape both the commercial space industry and NASA’s lunar ambitions.
“Standing down from today’s tenth flight of Starship to allow time to troubleshoot an issue with ground systems,” SpaceX posted on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter. CEO Elon Musk added that the leak needed to be fixed before any further attempt. SpaceX quickly rescheduled the launch for Monday night, aiming for a 7:30 p.m. Eastern time liftoff, but the rocket remains grounded as the team races to resolve the technical issue.
Starship, towering at 400 feet, is the most powerful rocket ever built. It’s designed to be fully reusable, with both its upper-stage spacecraft and massive Super Heavy booster returning to the launch site for recovery by giant mechanical arms. If SpaceX can pull off this vision, the implications are staggering: bigger payloads, dramatically lower launch costs, and, perhaps most tantalizingly, the ability to send humans to Mars. The Starship system consists of a spacecraft stacked atop the Super Heavy booster, which is powered by an array of 33 engines.
But as SpaceX pushes the boundaries of rocket engineering, the journey has been anything but smooth. The company’s “break it and fix it” philosophy—favoring rapid prototyping and real-world testing over exhaustive ground analysis—has led to a series of spectacular failures. The seventh, eighth, and ninth test flights all ended prematurely, with the upper-stage Starship failing at earlier points than some of its predecessors. The ninth flight, conducted in May, managed to reach space, but a failure in the fuel tank pressurization system diffuser caused a methane leak in the nose cone. This mishap led to the skipping of a critical in-space engine burn and the deployment of Starlink mock-up satellites. The vehicle tumbled uncontrollably before burning up as it re-entered over the Indian Ocean.
The two previous flights fared even worse, with the Starship upper stage disintegrating during ascent, causing disruptions to air traffic across Florida and the Caribbean. In response, SpaceX redesigned the faulty diffuser, hoping to avoid a repeat performance. Yet, the shadow of failure loomed large. In June, the upper stage originally slated for the tenth test flight exploded on the ground during an engine test, destroying the spacecraft and inflicting significant damage on a separate SpaceX test site. Fortunately, no injuries were reported.
The stakes for the next test could hardly be higher. “The stakes are the highest they’ve ever been for a Starship launch,” Todd Harrison, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, told The New York Times. However, he cautioned against seeing this as a make-or-break moment for SpaceX. “If they have another failure, they still have more room to continue iterating and trying, but they are running out of room.”
For this tenth flight, SpaceX planned a series of crucial tests. The Super Heavy booster was to propel the rocket through the densest part of Earth’s atmosphere before separating and simulating a landing over the Gulf of Mexico. Engineers hoped to test alternative engine configurations during the booster’s descent. Meanwhile, the upper-stage Starship would continue toward orbital velocities, following a trajectory that would re-enter over the Indian Ocean. Along the way, it was set to deploy eight mock-ups of next-generation Starlink internet satellites and conduct a brief in-space engine burn—a maneuver vital for future missions that require the spacecraft to re-enter orbit and then fire its engines to drop out again. SpaceX also planned experiments to assess Starship’s ability to survive the rigors of re-entry.
Why all the fuss? The answer lies not just in Musk’s dreams of Mars, but in the rocket’s pivotal role in NASA’s Artemis program. Starship has been selected as the lunar lander for Artemis III, the mission intended to return American astronauts to the moon’s south pole for the first time in over 50 years. The mission is officially scheduled for late 2027, but with Starship’s development delays, most experts—including those within NASA—now expect the landing to slip to 2028 or beyond. Before Artemis III can proceed, SpaceX must demonstrate the ability to launch multiple Starships in quick succession and transfer propellants between vehicles in orbit, capabilities that are still unproven.
SpaceX’s ambitions don’t stop at the moon. Musk has repeatedly stated his goal of sending uncrewed Starships to Mars as early as 2026, with the first crewed flight potentially following in 2028. Yet, even Musk admits the timeline is uncertain. “We’ll try to make that opportunity, if we get lucky,” he said in May. “I think we’ll probably have a 50/50 chance right now.”
Meanwhile, the international space race is heating up. China, which has made steady progress on its own lunar program, recently announced the successful test of a lunar lander. Many analysts now believe there’s a greater than even chance that China could beat NASA’s Artemis III to the lunar surface. Harrison, the space policy expert, downplayed the potential impact, saying, “It’s not the end of the world. It is more of a psychological kind of hit than anything.” Still, the prospect of losing the symbolic race back to the moon is sure to weigh on both NASA and its commercial partners.
For now, all eyes remain on SpaceX’s Starbase in Texas, where the world’s most powerful rocket sits waiting for another shot at history. Engineers are working around the clock to fix the liquid oxygen leak and prepare for the next launch attempt. Whether Starship soars or stumbles, the outcome will shape the future of space exploration for years to come.
The story of Starship is far from over. Each setback brings new lessons, and each launch attempt—successful or not—pushes the boundaries of what’s possible. As SpaceX and its partners look ahead, the world watches, wondering: Is the next giant leap for humanity just a launch away?
