SpaceX earns revenue through three primary streams: government launches, commercial launches and Starlink, its satellite-based internet service. As in previous years, Starlink is expected to be the company’s main revenue driver, accounting for about 80 percent of total revenue in 2025, per market research firm Quilty Space.
In 2024, Starlink generated $7.8 billion in revenue, Quilty reports. More than half of that came from commercial customers, while government contracts contributed around $3 billion.
Starlink currently operates the world’s largest satellite constellation, with roughly 7,000 satellites in low-Earth orbit. SpaceX aims to expand the network by another 30,000 satellites. The service now has more than 5 million users across 125 countries.
The remainder of SpaceX’s revenue will come from its launch business, which serves both government and commercial clients using the Falcon family of rockets. In 2024, the company completed 134 launches—more than any other operator globally. It plans to increase that number to 170 this year. NASA alone is expected to contribute $1.1 billion to SpaceX’s 2025 revenue, according to Musk.
“Commercial revenue from space will exceed the entire budget of NASA next year,” Musk said. The U.S. space agency is expected to face steep funding cuts under the Trump administration, which has proposed slashing NASA’s budget from $24.8 billion in 2025 to $18.8 billion in 2026.
SpaceX was valued at $350 billion last year after completing a secondary shares sale, making it one of the most valuable private firms in the world.
But SpaceX is also spending heavily. It is developing the Starship rocket system, a massive next-generation vehicle designed to eventually carry humans to the Moon and Mars. So far, SpaceX has conducted nine orbital test flights of Starship and aims to begin uncrewed missions to Mars as early as 2026.
SpaceX CEO Elon Musk on the next giant leap for mankind – CBS News
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As the founder, CEO and lead designer at SpaceX, a private company that makes rockets and spacecraft, Elon Musk envisions a time when his reusable rockets will bring people to the moon and Mars. He’s focused on humans becoming a “multi-planet species,” and on the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 mission, he speaks with Jeffrey Kluger (editor-at-large at Time magazine, and the co-author of “Apollo 13”) about his vision for the future.
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Mankind has never been closer to setting foot on Mars. NASA is completing construction of its new Mars rover, in readiness for launching next summer, while SpaceX is firing prototypes of its Mars rocket engines, getting ready for short test flights in late 2020. David Pogue reports on the prognosis for manned exploration of the Red Planet, and how human endurance is being tested in a habitat constructed on the slopes of a Hawaiian volcano.
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Jared Isaacman has twice been to space with Elon Musk’s SpaceX. Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images
Just days before his expected Senate confirmation, billionaire tech entrepreneur Jared Isaacman—closely aligned with Elon Musk’s SpaceX—has been withdrawn as President Donald Trump’s nominee for NASA administrator. The announcement came on the same day Musk stepped down from the government’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), and follows renewed scrutiny of Isaacman’s past political donations to Democratic candidates. A new nominee for NASA administrator will be announced soon, according to Trump, who said he will prioritize someone who is “mission aligned” and can put America “first in space.”
“After a thorough review of prior associations, I am hereby withdrawing the nomination of Jared Isaacman to head NASA,” Trump announced in a May 31 post on his social media platform, Truth Social. Trump had named Isaacman as his choice in December. While Isaacman contributed $2 million to Trump’s inauguration, campaign finance records show he has also donated to Democrats, including U.S. Senator Mark Kelly of Arizona.
“The President, NASA and the American people deserve the very best—an Administrator ready to reorganize, rebuild and rally the best and brightest minds to deliver the world-changing headlines NASA was built to create,” said Isaacman in an X post after Trump’s announcement. “I have not flown my last mission—whatever form that may ultimately take—but I remain incredibly optimistic that humanity’s greatest spacefaring days lie ahead,” he added.
Despite his close ties to Musk’s space venture, Isaacman has shown a willingness to diverge from the billionaire’s views. During his April nomination hearing before the Senate Commerce Committee, he stated he would prioritize NASA’s moon program—a mission Musk has previously dismissed as a “distraction.”
Senator Tim Sheehy, a Republican from Montana and member of the Senate Commerce Committee, defended Isaacman just hours before the withdrawal was announced. “I was proud to introduce Jared at his hearing and strongly oppose efforts to derail his nomination,” Sheehy said on May 31.
Reaction to the withdrawal was swift. Jonathan McDowell, an astronomer at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, called it “bad news” for NASA, while far-right activist Laura Loomer speculated that the move was “an effort to damage ties between President Trump and Elon Musk before the 2026 midterms.”
Trump said a new nominee for NASA administrator will be announced soon, adding that he will prioritize someone “mission aligned” who can put America “first in space.”
In the beginning, Donald Trump and Elon Musk got along great. “He is a truly incredible guy,” Trump said at a campaign rally last October, “and I don’t say that that often.”
The president invited Musk into the Oval Office and Cabinet meetings. Musk called himself “first buddy.”
Mr. Trump welcomed Musk’s idea to create a Department of Government Efficiency. [“You gotta give him credit!” the president told reporters.] Musk demonstrated his goals for DOGE by wielding a chainsaw at a February meeting of the Conservative Political Action Conference. “This is the chainsaw for bureaucracy!” he bellowed.
Elon Musk holds a chainsaw reading “Long live freedom, damn it” during the annual Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) at the Gaylord National Resort & Convention Center at National Harbor in Oxon Hill, Maryland, on February 20, 2025.
SAUL LOEB/AFP via Getty Images
In four months, DOGE took the chainsaw to every federal department: 250,000 workers were fired or bought out; Musk even slashed grants and staffing at environmental agencies, like the EPA and NOAA, after decades of warning about the risks of climate change.
Tesla profits plummeted by 71%—and Musk’s net worth dropped by $100 billion.
Last month, Musk finally left Washington, but still intended to work on DOGE a day or two a week. And this past Tuesday, he offered “Sunday Morning” an interview at SpaceX’s headquarters near Brownsville, at the southern tip of Texas.
“It’s a bit unfair”
We knew we were in the right neighborhood when we saw a huge bust of Musk, installed by his admirers—and vandalized by his critics.
A vandalized bust of Elon Musk outside his SpaceX facility in southern Texas.
CBS News
But the interview didn’t get off to a smooth start.
I asked, “I noticed that all of your businesses involve a lot of components, a lot of parts. Do the tariffs and the trade wars affect any of this?”
“You know, tariffs always affect things a little bit,” Musk replied.
“I’m wondering what your thought is on the ban on foreign students, the proposal. I mean, you were one of those kids, right?”
“Yeah. I mean, I think we wanna stick to, you know, the subject of the day, which is, like, spaceships, as opposed to, you know, presidential policy,” Musk said.
“Oh, okay,” I said. “I was told anything is good, but…”
“No, well—no,” Musk replied.
Correspondent David Pogue and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, who says he is stepping away from his White House role at the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).
CBS News
But Musk was willing to talk about the DOGE firestorm. I asked him, “You’ve spoken about how much of a grind and a stress it was on you, and you know, Tesla’s reputation took a hit, your reputation took a hit. People are very upset about [effects on] Social Security, and national parks, and air traffic, and food safety, and cancer research, Alzheimer’s research. Now that you’ve had a chance to look at it, might there have been a different approach?”
Musk said, “Yeah, I think … what was starting to happen was that, like, it’s a bit unfair because, like, DOGE became the whipping boy for everything. So, if there was some cut, real or imagined, everyone would blame DOGE. I’ve had people think that, like, somehow DOGE is gonna stop them from getting their Social Security check, which is completely untrue.”
I asked, “I was just thinking about the, you know, ‘move fast and break things,’ you know, before you really understand what the agency does?”
“Yeah, I mean, I guess part of it is, like, is it depends on where you’re coming from,” Musk said. “I’m like a proponent of smaller government, not bigger government. So, now if somebody’s a proponent of, you know, more government programs and bigger government, and they see, ‘Hey, DOGE is cutting all these government programs,’ then they’ll be fundamentally opposed to that because they just think the government should do more things. That’s just a fundamental, I guess, ideological opinion.
“But my frank opinion of the government is that, like, the government is just, like, the DMV that got big, okay? So, when you say it like, ‘Let’s have the government do something,’ you should think, ‘Do you want the DMV to do it?'”
And then, Musk started talking about the Trump administration, without even being asked about Trump. “And you know, it’s not like I agree with everything the administration does,” said Musk. “So it’s like, I mean, I agree with much of what the administration does. But we have differences of opinion. You know, there are things that I don’t entirely agree with. But it’s difficult for me to bring that up in an interview because then it creates a bone of contention. So then, I’m a little stuck in a bind, where I’m like, well, I don’t wanna, you know, speak up against the administration, but I also don’t wanna take responsibility for everything this administration’s doing.”
On the “Big, Beautiful Bill”
In Washington, federal workers say that DOGE has left the government’s operations in disarray. And worst of all, it might have all been for nothing. Musk claims to have saved the government $175 billion so far (nowhere close to his original target of $2 trillion, or even his revised target of $1 trillion).
And that was before the president’s new spending bill passed the House. According to the Congressional Budget Office, the president’s proposed budget will add $3.8 trillion to our debt over the next ten years. It’s now being debated in the Senate.
Musk said, “I was, like, disappointed to see the massive spending bill, frankly, which increases the budget deficit, doesn’t decrease it, and undermines the work that the DOGE team is doing.”
I said, “I actually thought that, when this ‘big, beautiful bill’ came along, it’d be like, everything he’s done on DOGE gets wiped out in the first year.”
“I think a bill can be big or it can be beautiful,” Musk laughed. “But I don’t know if it could be both. My personal opinion.”
And here is where the story gets a little complicated.
On Tuesday, right after our interview, CBS News released a clip of it to promote this very report. It was that part, where Musk criticizes Trump’s spending bill, and his remarks became news. It went all the way to the White House, where the president was asked about Musk’s criticism of the bill. Within 24 hours, Musk announced that his time in the Trump administration was officially over. Out of DOGE, out of government.
Musk said that the reason was that his limited 130-day stint as advisor was ending. But until that moment, he’d beensaying that he still intended to work on DOGE part-time. “Well, DOGE is gonna continue, just as a way of life,” he told us. “I will have some participation in that, but as I’ve said publicly, my focus has to be on the companies at this point.”
Truth is, the Trump-Musk relationship had already seemed to be cooling. The president used to post about Musk about six times a week. But by April, he’d stopped mentioning Musk altogether.
Still, on Friday, they held a media event at the White House to confirm their mutual admiration—and to leave the door open for future collaboration. “Elon’s really not leaving,” Mr. Trump said. “He’s gonna be back and forth, I think, I have a feeling.”
Musk added, “The DOGE team is doing an incredible job. They’re going to continue doing an incredible job, and I will continue to be visiting here and be a friend and advisor to the president.”
President Donald Trump looks on as Elon Musk speaks during a news conference in the Oval Office of the White House, Friday, May 30, 2025, in Washington.
Evan Vucci / AP
Musk might be the first to admit that his DOGE experiment gave him a black eye—like the actual black eye he had on Friday, which he says he got from his five-year-old son … or the matching one on that statue.
At least for now, Musk says that his focus will be running his business ventures: Tesla, Starlink, X, xAI, Neuralink, Optimus robots, the Boring Company, and SpaceX.
I asked, “Are all of your businesses related in some way?”
“I guess you can think of the businesses as things that improve the probable trajectory of civilization,” Musk replied. “So you know, for making life multi-planetary or extending life to Mars, the idea there is to ensure the long-term survival of life and consciousness as we know it.”
After our interview Tuesday, we were invited to witness the ninth launch of his Starship, the biggest rocket ever built. The two previous Starship tests ended in explosions – or, as SpaceX puts it, “rapid unscheduled disassemblies.” So, all eyes were on Test Launch 9 to see if a Starship could return to Earth in one piece.
As Musk left our interview to watch the launch, he said something that could sum up all his enterprises: “I can’t guarantee success, but I can guarantee excitement.”
David Pogue is a six-time Emmy winner for his stories on “CBS Sunday Morning,” where he’s been a correspondent since 2002. Pogue hosts the CBS News podcast “Unsung Science.” He’s also a New York Times bestselling author, a five-time TED speaker, and host of 20 NOVA science specials on PBS. For 13 years, he wrote a New York Times tech column every week – and for 10 years, a Scientific American column every month.
China has two Long March missions tentatively scheduled in June. VCG/VCG via Getty Images
After a packed spring season, the space industry is easing into summer with a relatively slow start. Only a handful of missions are confirmed for June, though the month could see more activity as tentative launch windows solidify. SpaceX remains the most active player, with a number of scheduled Falcon 9 launches, including a private astronaut mission to the International Space Station and three deployments of Starlink satellites. These come shortly after a high-profile setback for SpaceX’s Starship, the largest and most powerful rocket ever built, which failed to return intact following a propellant leak that caused it to spin out of control.
China is also expected to continue expanding its satellite network, with two Long March rocket launches tentatively scheduled. Below are the key space missions to watch in June:
June 2, June 3 and June 8: SpaceX launches back-to-back Starlink missions. SpaceX will kick off the month with consecutive Falcon 9 missions. On June 2, a Falcon 9 will launch a batch of Starlink v2-mini satellites (Starlink 12-19) into low-Earth orbit from Cape Canaveral Space Force Base in Florida. The next day, another Falcon 9 will lift off from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California, carrying 22 additional Starlink v2-mini satellites (Starlink 11-22). Then, on June 8, a third batch of Starlink satellites (Starlink 15-8) will lift off from Vandenberg.
June 8:Axiom Mission 4 launches to the ISS. A SpaceX Falcon 9 will launch Axiom Mission 4 (Ax-4), a private crewed mission to the ISS, following a delay from late May. Operated by Texas-based Axiom Space, the mission will carry four astronauts who will spend up to 14 days conducting scientific research aboard the ISS. The crew is led by former NASA astronaut Peggy Whitson—her second time commanding a private spaceflight. Joining her are Shubhanshu Shukla, ESA astronaut Sławomir Uznański, and Tibor Kapu. Shukla will make history as the first Indian astronaut to visit the ISS.
June 23 or June 24: Japan launches the final mission of Mitsubishi’s H-2A rocket. Japan plans to launch an Earth-observing satellite no earlier than June 23 from the Tanegashima Space Center. The satellite is a joint effort by the Ministry of the Environment, the National Institute for Environmental Studies, and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA). This mission will also mark the final flight of the H-2A rocket, developed by Mitsubishi Heavy Industries.
TBD: China launches two Long March missions. China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation (CASC) has two Long March missions planned for June. These launches will deliver communication satellites into low-Earth orbit as part of China’s expanding space infrastructure.
TBD: Sierra Space sends a spaceplane to the ISS. Colorado-based Sierra Space is preparing for a milestone mission: the first launch of its reusable Dream Chaser spaceplane to the ISS. The spaceplane will ride aboard a ULA Vulcan Centaur rocket from Cape Canaveral, marking the first time a winged commercial spacecraft visits the space station.
Elon Musk recently promised to spend more time running Tesla. Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
Now that Elon Musk has wrapped up his high-profile advisory role in Washington, a group of Tesla’s institutional investors is pressing him to return his full attention to the company, which has seen sales plummet in key markets in recent months. The investors point to slowing electric vehicle sales and a slumping stock price as evidence that Tesla needs Musk back at the helm.
The signatories include New York City Comptroller Brad Lander, Oregon State Treasurer Elizabeth Steiner, the American Federation of Teachers, Denmark’s AkademikerPension, and the SOC Investment Group, which collaborates with labor union pension funds to back shareholder initiatives. SOC is the investment arm of the Strategic Organizing Center, a coalition of North American labor unions.
“The current crisis at Tesla puts into sharp focus the long-term problems at the company stemming from the CEO’s absence, which is amplified by a Board that appears largely uninterested and unwilling to act in the best interest of all Tesla shareholders by demanding Musk’s full-time attention on Tesla,” the letter said.
The investors’ letter arrives as Tesla’s board reportedly weighs a new compensation plan for Musk, after a Delaware court struck down his controversial $56 billion pay package in 2023. The pension funds argue that any new agreement should come with a condition that that Musk commit to working at least 40 hours a week at Tesla.
“Given Musk’s leadership roles at four private companies and his foundation, the Board must ensure that Tesla is not treated as just one among many competing obligations,” the letter said.
Musk recently promised to refocus on Tesla and scale back his role as the head of the Trump administration’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE). “Back to spending 24/7 at work and sleeping in conference/server/factory rooms. I must be super focused on X/xAI and Tesla . . . as we have critical technologies rolling out,” he wrote on X earlier this month.
Musk is the largest shareholder of Tesla, owning about 13 percent of the company. Its other major shareholders include institutional funds such as Vanguard, BlackRock and State Street. Because Tesla is part of the S&P 500 index (since December 2020), many pension funds that invest in index funds also own shares in Tesla. The signatories of this week’s letter collectively hold about 0.25 percent of Tesla, worth roughly $3 billion.
Elon Musk said SpaceX will test launch a Starship rocket every few weeks. CHANDAN KHANNA/AFP via Getty Images
Elon Musk’s SpaceX yesterday (May 27) launched its ninth integrated flight test (IFT-9) of the Mars-colonizing Starship rocket system from Starbase, Texas. While the mission ultimately ended in failure, it marked meaningful progress in reusability and data collection—two pillars of SpaceX’s development strategy.
The test featured the first reuse of SpaceX’s Super Heavy booster, the powerful first stage of Starship, which previously flew in January. The same booster was launched again last night and successfully separated from the upper-stage Starship vehicle.
Instead of aiming for a standard splashdown, SpaceX deliberately programmed the booster’s descent to be more extreme, pushing the hardware to its limits. The goal: to gather detailed data on how the system performs under punishing conditions. But during its attempt to reignite for a controlled landing, the booster suffered a catastrophic failure and broke apart before reaching the Gulf of Mexico (or Gulf of America).
The upper-stage Starship continued its climb, achieving main engine cutoff and holding a stable trajectory longer than in past tests. However, the mission faltered when a key payload door failed to open, preventing the release of mock Starlink satellites. That payload deployment system—meant to mimic a Pez dispenser—was a major element under review.
Soon after, a leak caused the vehicle to lose pressure in its main fuel tanks, triggering a destabilizing spin that made engine relight and reentry control impossible. The starship disintegrated during atmospheric reentry, in what SpaceX called a “rapid unscheduled disassembly” during its live stream.
Still, engineers noted one quiet success: the heat shield remained intact through ascent, with no major tile loss—a milestone for future survivability.
“Leaks caused loss of main tank pressure during the coast and re-entry phase. Lots of good data to review,” Elon Musk posted on X. He also hinted that future launches could occur monthly, depending on how quickly issues are addressed.
Monday’s launch followed a lengthy FAA review and several hardware upgrades, prompted by two upper-stage failures earlier this year. Starship remains at the core of Musk’s ambitions for Mars colonization and interplanetary living. SpaceX currently holds several multibillion-dollar NASA contracts to build human landing systems on the Moon under the Artemis program.
Omead Afshar, vice president of North American and European operations
Afshar joined Tesla in 2017 as a project manager in the CEO’s office after working in the medical device industry. He later became project director and, in 2020, was promoted to senior director of Tesla’s Austin Gigafactory—a role he cheekily sums up on LinkedIn with a cowboy emoji.
In 2022, Afshar stepped back from day-to-day Tesla operations following an internal investigation into Project 42, a glass-walled structure allegedly intended as a residence for Musk—an allegation the CEO has denied. During this period, Afshar became more involved in other Musk ventures, including SpaceX and X.
His Tesla profile has since rebounded, now overseeing the company’s operations in North America and Europe. Known for his close rapport with Musk, he’s reportedly earned the nickname “the Musk whisperer.”
Lars Moravy, vice president of vehicle engineering
Moravy has served as Tesla’s vice president of vehicle engineering for the past six years, leading a team of over 2,000 engineers responsible for hardware design, development, testing, automation and manufacturing. He has worked on every major Tesla model, including the Model S, Model X, Model 3, Model Y, Cybertruck and the upcoming Robotaxi.
Moravy joined Tesla more than 15 years ago, contributing to vehicle frame development. Prior to that, he spent eight years at Honda R&D. On a recent episode of the Ride the Lightning podcast, he said he made the leap to Tesla because it combined his passion for automobiles and environmental impact.
Brandon Ehrhart, general counsel and corporate secretary
Tesla appointed Ehrhart as general counsel and corporate secretary in 2023. He previously spent two decades in the telecommunications industry, most notably at DISH Network, where he served as general counsel for DISH Wireless. His legal background also includes roles at EchoStar Corporation and as an associate at DLA Piper.
At Tesla, Ehrhart leads a legal team that, according to a past LinkedIn post, aims to manage “all aspects of litigation and trial work, including briefings, hearings, discovery, depositions and trials, completely in-house.”
Franz von Holzhausen, senior design executive
Von Holzhausen brings decades of experience in automotive design to Tesla. Before joining the company, he worked on high-profile projects such as the Volkswagen New Beetle and held design positions at General Motors and Mazda. He became Tesla’s senior design executive in 2008 and has since led design efforts for every major model, including the Model S, Model X, Model 3, Model Y, Cybertruck and the second-generation Roadster.
Ashok Elluswamy, vice president of A.I. software
Elluswamy leads Tesla’s A.I. software division, a key area the company expects to expand. He has headed the team since October 2024 and, according to his LinkedIn, is focused on “anything and everything required to get self-driving 4-wheeled robots driving widely.” His previous work includes developing Tesla’s in-house computer vision system and applying A.I. to tackle complex autonomous driving challenges.
Elluswamy joined Tesla in 2014 and was later praised by Musk as the company’s first official hire for the A.I. and Autopilot team. “Without him and our awesome team, we would just be another car company looking for an autonomy supplier that doesn’t exist,” Musk wrote on X last year.
Michael Snyder, vice president of energy and charging
Snyder began his Tesla career in 2014 as a staff electrical engineer and steadily rose through the ranks of the company’s energy division. He previously served as senior director of megapack production and business before being promoted in 2024 to vice president of energy and charging. In this role, he oversees Tesla’s integrated sustainable energy ecosystem, which includes solar, storage and charging infrastructure.
Before joining Tesla, Snyder worked at engineering and energy companies including HDR, SunPower Corporation and Flack + Kurtz.
Laurie Shelby, vice president of environment, health and safety
Shelby has led Tesla’s environment, health and safety (EHS) operations since 2017, overseeing workplace safety and compliance efforts for more than 100,000 employees across automotive, energy and delivery divisions. One of Tesla’s most senior female executives, she brings decades of experience in industrial safety. Prior to Tesla, she spent 17 years at Alcoa and held key roles at Reynold Metals, Radian Corporation and Dominion Virginia Power.
Karn Budhiraj and Roshan Thomas, vice presidents of supply chain
Tesla’s vast and complex global supply chain is co-managed by two executives: Budhiraj and Thomas. Budhiraj joined Tesla in 2014, bringing prior experience from Apple’s supply chain team and a consulting background at Deloitte. He initially oversaw powertrain and electronics programs before being promoted to vice president of supply chain in 2018. He now manages key areas such as batteries, electronics, construction, manufacturing and distribution.
Thomas, who reports directly to Musk, was appointed vice president in 2020. He is responsible for vehicle and solar sourcing and other critical supply functions. Thomas joined Tesla in 2019 as a purchasing manager for propulsion, thermal and climate systems, following earlier roles in supply operations at Tellabs and Sanmina.
SpaceX launched its huge Super Heavy-Starship mega rocket on its seventh test flight Thursday, successfully “catching” the first stage booster back at its firing stand but losing its new-generation Starship upper stage spacecraft, which apparently broke up as it was reaching space. Falling debris from the destroyed Starship briefly delayed airline traffic out of Miami, Florida, federal officials said.
Telemetry from the Starship froze eight minutes and 27 seconds after launch following unexpected engine shutdowns or failures. SpaceX later confirmed the ship’s destruction in a posting on X, using a tongue-in-cheek description:
“Starship experienced a rapid unscheduled disassembly during its ascent burn. Teams will continue to review data from today’s flight test to better understand root cause. With a test like this, success comes from what we learn, and today’s flight will help us improve Starship’s reliability.”
A Super Heavy-Starship – the most powerful rocket ever built – blasts off from SpaceX’s Gulf Coast manufacturing and flight test facility.
SpaceX
“We (lost) all communications with the ship,” a SpaceX launch commentator said of the Starship. “That is essentially telling us we had an anomaly with the upper stage.” A moment later, he confirmed: “We did lose the upper stage.”
The Federal Aviation Administration also reported that airline traffic at Miami International and Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International airports was delayed up to an hour due to what it described as a “rocket launch anomaly.”
The FAA in a statement said it “briefly slowed and diverted aircraft around the area where space vehicle debris was falling.” It said normal operations had resumed.
“The FAA is aware an anomaly occurred during the SpaceX Starship Flight 7 mission that launched from Boca Chica, Texas, on Jan. 16,” the agency said in a follow-up statement, adding that it is “assessing the operation.”
Video posted to social media and verified by CBS News showed debris from the Starship falling in the area of Turks and Caicos Islands in the Caribbean.
SpaceX’s billionaire owner Elon Musk later hinted at a possible cause, posting to his X platform: “Preliminary indication is that we had an oxygen/fuel leak in the cavity above the ship engine firewall that was large enough to build pressure in excess of the vent capacity. Apart from obviously double-checking for leaks, we will add fire suppression to that volume and probably increase vent area.”
In a news release, SpaceX said that “initial data indicates a fire developed in the aft section of the ship, leading to a rapid unscheduled disassembly with debris falling into the Atlantic Ocean within the predefined hazard areas.”
SpaceX said that anyone who finds what they think is debris should call local authorities or the company’s debris hotline at 1-866-623-0234.
The gargantuan rocket blasted off from SpaceX’s Boca Chica, Texas, manufacturing and flight test facility on the Gulf Coast at 5:37 p.m. Eastern Time, firing up 33 methane-burning Raptor engines generating up to 16 million pounds of thrust.
Gulping 40,000 pounds of propellant per second, the booster climbed away from its launch stand and gracefully arced over to the east atop a long jet of flaming exhaust visible for dozens of miles around.
Two minutes and 40 seconds after liftoff, the Super Heavy fell away and the Starship continued the climb to space on the power of its six Raptor engines.
A camera on the Starship upper stage captures first stage separation and its flip maneuver to head back to the launch pad for capture.
SpaceX
The booster, meanwhile, flipped around, re-ignited several engines to reverse course and headed back toward Boca Chica where the unique mechanical arms on the rocket’s launch gantry were open and waiting.
Plummeting tail first back to Earth, the Super Heavy re-ignited its engines, tilting as they steered it to the pad, and then settled straight down between the chopsticks, which smoothly closed to capture their quarry in mid air.
The first such catch last October was successful, a jaw-dropping sight to thousands of cheering residents and tourists. But the Super Heavy used for the next such flight a month later was diverted to a Gulf of Mexico splashdown because of launch damage to sensors on the tower that were needed to help guide the descending booster into position.
New sensors with have more robust shielding were put in place to eliminate such damage and SpaceX engineers are optimistic they’ll soon be recovering Super Heavy boosters with the same regularity they’ve demonstrated with the company’s workhorse Falcon 9 rockets, a key element in SpaceX’s drive to lower launch costs.
In keeping with the reusability theme, the Super Heavy’s 33 Raptor engines included one that flew on a previous test flight to demonstrate its ability to fly multiple missions.
The bulk of the upgrades tested Thursday were built into what SpaceX called a “new generation” Starship. Two minutes after the booster “landed,” the upper stage reached space.
SpaceX
In a spectacular sight, the first stage is captured by giant mechanical arms back at the launch pad after boosting the Starship upper stage out of the lower atmosphere.
SpaceX
But the loss of telemetry left flight controllers in the dark about what might have happened in the final stages of the ascent.
For these initial test flights, the Starships do not attempt to reach orbit. Instead, they loop halfway around the planet and descend belly-first through a hellish blaze of atmospheric friction before flipping nose up for a tail-first, rocket-powered splashdown in the Indian Ocean.
For Thursday’s flight, major test objectives included restarting a Raptor engine in space and the deployment of 10 dummy Starlink mockups to test a new satellite delivery system that works a bit like a Pez candy dispenser. Starships are expected to launch thousands of Starlinks after the rocket is operational.
Among the other upgrades were smaller stabilizing fins, repositioned to reduce their exposure to re-entry heating, an improved propulsion avionics system, redesigned fuel feed lines and a 25% increase in propellant volume to improve performance.
A pre-launch view of the Starship upper stage between the open mechanical arms, or “chopsticks,” that close to capture the first stage when it returns from space.
SpaceX
The redesigned avionics system includes a more powerful flight computer, new antennas that combine signals from Starlink and GPS navigation satellites, “smart batteries” and power units to drive two dozen high-voltage actuators and redesigned navigation sensors.
SpaceX also added additional cameras, with more than 30 on board to provide direct views of critical systems using operational Starlink satellites to stream real-time video and data to the ground.
While the spacecraft is designed to be fully reusable, SpaceX has not yet made any attempts to capture a returning Starship or, for that matter, a Falcon 9 upper stage.
But Thursday’s test flight featured multiple experiments to test a variety of heat shield improvements, including metallic tiles and one with active cooling, along with dummy Starship catch fittings, to learn more about how they will respond to re-entry heating.
“This new year will be transformational for Starship,” SpaceX said on its website, “with the goal of bringing reuse of the entire system online and flying increasingly ambitious missions as we iterate towards being able to send humans and cargo to Earth orbit, the moon, and Mars.”
Getting the Super Heavy-Starship flying on a regular basis is critical to NASA’s Artemis moon program. NASA is paying SpaceX to develop a variant of the Starship upper stage to carry astronauts down to the lunar surface in the 2027 timeframe.
To send a Starship to the moon, SpaceX must first launch it to low-Earth orbit where a succession of other Starship “tankers” will have to rendezvous, dock and autonomously refuel the moon-bound ship so it can blast out of Earth orbit and head for deep space.
Astronauts launched in an Orion capsule atop NASA’s Space Launch System rocket then will rendezvous with the Starship in orbit around the moon for the descent to the surface.
NASA’s contract requires one unpiloted lunar landing test flight before astronauts can be cleared to ride one down to the surface. The ongoing test program will determine when that might be possible.
Bill Harwood has been covering the U.S. space program full-time since 1984, first as Cape Canaveral bureau chief for United Press International and now as a consultant for CBS News.
