The third flight of SpaceX’s giant Starship spacecraft may be more ambitious and complex than the first two.
The upcoming mission could include a refueling test, according to a recent presentation by Lakeisha Hawkins, deputy associate administrator of NASA’s Moon to Mars Program Office.
Hawkins spoke Monday (Dec. 4) about the agency’s infrastructure and technology programs with a panel from the U.S. National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. One of its slides noted that SpaceX recently launched its second Starship mission and stated that the company is “moving quickly” toward a third mission, “which will include a propellant transfer demonstration.”
Hawkins did not read those words aloud or discuss the planned refueling experiment during the meeting, and NASA has since backed away from the statement slightly: Agency spokesperson He told CNBC “No final decisions have been made regarding the timing.” (You can watch Hawkins’ presentation here; The highlighted slide appears at the 120-minute mark.)
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Both NASA and SpaceX view transporting propellant beyond Earth as a key enabler for bold exploration work, such as establishing manned outposts on the Moon and Mars. Rockets and spacecraft burn most of their fuel just to get out of Earth’s deep gravity well, so they’ll need to fill their tanks with electricity to travel to other destinations in the solar system.
The refueling test on board the spacecraft has been underway for some time. In October 2020, NASA awarded SpaceX $53 million to conduct such an experiment in Earth orbit. The contract calls for SpaceX to transfer 11 tons (10 metric tons) of liquid oxygen between tanks inside the Starship vehicle. (The Starship Raptor’s engines run on ultra-cold liquid oxygen and liquid methane.)
This is a step towards the envisioned operational strategy, which would involve traveling with Starship vehicles and rendezvous with “tanker” variants in Earth orbit.
NASA has a keen interest in developing Starship, SpaceX’s next-generation deep space transportation system. The agency has selected Starship as the first manned lunar lander for its Artemis program, which aims to establish a permanent and sustainable human presence on and around the moon by the end of the 2020s.
If all goes according to plan, Starship will land astronauts near the moon’s south pole for the first time in late 2025 or 2026, on the Artemis 3 mission. But things will have to go well for NASA and SpaceX to meet that deadline.
Starship has only had two launches so far, which were test missions in April and November of this year. Both flights aim to send the vehicle’s upper stage across most parts of the world, from SpaceX’s Starbase in south Texas to the Pacific Ocean near Hawaii.
No test flight has reached that mark. In the first mission, the Starship’s two stages failed to separate as planned, and SpaceX intentionally blew up the vehicle about four minutes after launch. Last month’s mission went more smoothly, achieving milestones like a successful separation phase, but it also ended early; The spacecraft’s upper stage exploded eight minutes after liftoff.
It’s not clear when Starship’s third flight will take place. SpaceX founder and CEO Elon Musk said the vehicle should be ready soon, but the technical hurdles are not the only ones the company must overcome. SpaceX still must obtain a launch license from the US Federal Aviation Administration, which is overseeing the investigation into what happened during last month’s launch.
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