Summary

  • After a successful launch and a nearly completed flight, contact with SpaceX's Starship rocket has been lost as it returned through Earth's atmosphere

  • On its live stream, SpaceX says it's "incredible to see how far we got this time around" and that it will take some time to understand what happened

  • This was its third and most successful attempt so far, after the previous two ran into difficulties

  • In April 2023, the 120m-tall (395ft) vehicle exploded four minutes after lift-off

  • Although a second test flight in November went further and higher, it was cut short because of technical issues

  • Speaking on the live stream before contact was lost, the SpaceX team say they've gone "further than we've ever come before"

  • You can follow our live stream of the launch by pressing 'Play' at the top of this page

Live Reporting

Edited by Aoife Walsh & Alex Binley

  1. What’s the plan for today’s launch?

    Jonathan Amos
    Science correspondent

    Spectators gather around Starship ahead of launchReuters

    Assuming everything goes as planned, Starship will rise up and head down range across the Gulf of Mexico in the direction of the Atlantic and Africa.

    Stage separation - when the booster has done its job and comes apart from the Ship - is timed to occur at about two minutes and 44 seconds into the flight. It's a key moment in the mission. The Ship actually starts up its engines just before separation to maintain momentum and push on towards space.

    SpaceX wants the Super Heavy booster to try to fly back to near the coast of Texas and come down vertically, to hover just above the Gulf's waters. It will then be allowed to topple over and sink.

    The Ship is expected to power on until eight minutes and 35 seconds after lift-off, at which point it will shut down its engines and coast. If it makes it this far, the Ship will be perhaps 150km (93 miles) above the Earth and moving at more than 20,000km/h (12,400mph).

  2. What is the Super Heavy Booster?

    Jonathan Amos
    Science correspondent

    The space vehicle comes in two halves. The bottom segment - the Super Heavy booster - does the job of getting everything off the ground. At its base are 33 engines, burning a mix of liquid methane and liquid oxygen.

    Engineers refer to the combination as methalox.

    Firing in unison, the cluster of engines should produce in excess of 70 meganewtons of thrust. To put that in context, Nasa's biggest rocket - the Space Launch System, or SLS - produces 39 meganewtons off the pad, and that's over 20% more than the old space shuttle system could generate.

    Starship is by far the most powerful launch system we've ever seen.

  3. What does the top half - the ‘Ship’ - do?

    Jonathan Amos
    Science correspondent

    Workers remove rocks and debris from the surrounding area as SpaceX's next-generation Starship spacecraft atop its powerful Super Heavy rocket is prepared for a third launchReuters

    The top half of Starship is called simply... the Ship. It's got six engines at its base, again burning methalox.

    It's the business end of the system in the sense that it's inside the Ship that satellites would be stowed or a crew would sit.

    Elon Musk says Starship should be able to put 150 tonnes of payload in a low-Earth orbit just a few hundred kilometres up.

    Workhorse rockets today can do no more than about 20 tonnes to a similar altitude, and those vehicles are in part, or wholly, expendable: you need a new vehicle, or elements of a new vehicle, every time you launch.

  4. Starship: An ambitious and next-generation reusable rocket

    Jonathan Amos
    Science correspondent

    The 120m-tall (393ft) Starship is attempting to usher in a revolution in space transportation. The vehicle is being designed to be fully reusable.

    All elements are intended to land propulsively back on Earth after use, be re-fuelled and then flown again. This is a hugely challenging endeavour and will take time to achieve (especially the landings).

    But if Starship can be made to work, it will change the way we access space and radically lower the cost of putting people and things in orbit.

  5. The most powerful rocket ever built aims for the stars … again

    Aoife Walsh
    Live reporter

    Hello and thank you for joining us at the BBC's mission control in London - more than 5,000 miles (8,000km) away from where Elon Musk's Starship rocket is set to make its third attempt at launching into the skies.

    SpaceX has indicated ahead of this morning's launch that this will be the company’s most ambitious undertaking, as it strives to get the mammoth rocket - which measures just over 120m (395ft) in height - off the ground.

    It will be the rocket's third test flight, following attempts in April and November last year.

    You'll be guided through the launch by our team here in London, alongside our science correspondent, Jonathan Amos. You can also watch the launch live by pressing the 'Play' button at the top of this page.