Oct. 13 (UPI) — SpaceX is planning the 11th flight test on Monday of its Starship, its two-stage, heavy-lift launch vehicle designed to one day take humans back to the moon and eventually to Mars.
The launch window will open at 6:15 p.m. CT at the company’s Starbase compound in Texas near the Gulf of Mexico and about 20 miles from Brownsville.
A live-streamed broadcast of the test flight will begin about 30 minutes prior to liftoff.
In August, the Elon Musk-owned SpaceX succeeded in its third attempt to launch the 10th Starship test mission after SpaceX officials scrubbed two prior launches.
Monday’s flight is expected to build on the “successful demonstrations” from its 10th test in August, according to officials, but with flight experiments “gathering data for the next generation Super Heavy booster, stress-testing Starship’s heatshield, and demonstrating maneuvers that will mimic the upper stage’s final approach for a future return to launch site.”
But on Monday, the company reiterated that the flight schedule was a “dynamic” process and “likely to change” as is the case with all other developmental testing.