May 27, 2025, 5:07 AM 1:48 SpaceX Starship Flight 8 launches from Orbital Launch Pad A at Boca Chica beach, March 6, 2025, in Boca Chica Beach, Texas. Brandon Bell/Getty Images Elon Musk has made no secret of his desire to send humans to Mars, and he wants SpaceX's Starship spacecraft to be the vehicle that gets them there. But before SpaceX and NASA can send astronauts to the red planet, the company must prove Starship can fly and return safely and reliably. After two recent Starship flight tests ended with the destruction of the spacecraft, SpaceX hopes the ninth time will be the charm. SpaceX has scheduled the unmanned ninth test flight of Starship for Tuesday from SpaceX's Starbase facility near Brownsville, Texas, with a launch window opening at 7:30 p.m. ET. SpaceX Starship Flight 8 launches from Orbital Launch Pad A at Boca Chica beach, March 6, 2025, in Boca Chica Beach, Texas. Brandon Bell/Getty Images May 19, 9:00 AM To reach orbit, Starship is mounted atop a 400-foot Super Heavy rocket powered by 33 Raptor engines, making it the most powerful rocket system ever developed, according to the company. Unlike the partially reusable Falcon 9, SpaceX aims for Starship to be fully reusable and capable of launching, landing and flying again with minimal maintenance. According to SpaceX, this test will mark "the first launch of a flight-proven Super Heavy booster," one that flew and returned during the seventh test flight. The company says 29 of the booster's 33 engines will also be reused from the previous test. Engineers inspected and replaced known single-use components like the heat shield but left the booster mostly intact to study real-world wear and tear. A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket launches the National Reconnaissance Offices (NRO) NROL-153 mission from Space Launch Complex 4 East (SLC-4E) at Vandenberg Space Force Base, Jan. 9, 2025, in Lompoc, Calif. Kirby Lee/Getty Images The booster won't attempt a return to the launch site this time. Instead, it will follow a modified flight path and "land" with a hard splashdown in the Gulf after testing new flight and landing configurations. One of the booster's engines will also be disabled during the final landing burn to determine whether a backup can compensate. The Starship upper stage will aim to complete objectives that eluded SpaceX during the previous missions, such as deploying eight Starlink satellite simulators, which would be a first for Starship, and performing a relight of a Raptor engine in space. MORE: SpaceX Dragon successfully splashes down, returning NASA astronauts back to Earth The spacecraft will also undergo extreme heat testing. Engineers have removed some of the thermal tiles used to protect the vehicle during reentry, exposing vulnerable areas on purpose, the company said. Different tile options and materials will also be tested during the launch. "Developmental testing by definition is unpredictable. But by putting hardware in a flight environment as frequently as possible, we're able to quickly learn and execute design changes as we seek to bring Starship online as a fully and rapidly reusable vehicle," SpaceX said in its launch announcement. Related Topics