47SpaceX is preparing to launch the eighth flight of Starship on Monday, with the goal of completing the objectives set out during Flight 7 when Ship 33 was lost during its post-staging burn. Flight 8 will attempt the third successful booster catch, while Ship 34 will splashdown in the Indian Ocean. Flight 8 attempted a launch on March 3 but scrubbed due booster issues at T-40 seconds and is attempting to recycle within 24 hours, assuming the issues are simple to fix.
Flight 7
Starship Flight 7 flew back on Jan 16, 2025, and was the first flight of a Block 2 ship. Booster 14 flew a nearly perfect mission with the only blemish being an engine not reigniting on the Boost Back burn. But as a testament to the resilience of SpaceX’s flight computers, the engine reignited for the landing burn. This was later attributed to lower power in the engine igniter.
Booster 14 then completed its landing after being caught by Tower A. Becoming the second booster to be caught by a tower, since then Booster 14 has been inside Mega Bay 1 undergoing refurbishment.
Booster 14 Landing Burn (Credit: Jack Beyer for NSF)
Ship 33, however, suffered an anomaly that led to the loss of the vehicle during its ascent burn. This caused the ship to break apart in flight and pieces were scattered across the Atlantic Ocean near the Turks and Caicos Islands.
According to SpaceX, this failure was a leak above the engine bay shielding and below the aft dome, which is what is being called the attic. This leak was caused by harmonic oscillations, likely from engine and propellant lines.
This led to an uncontrolled powerful vibration that likely broke some of the propellant lines, leading to the leak. A possible reason these oscillations are new for Block 2 could be due to changing the transfer tubes from one to four, with each Raptor Vacuum having its own transfer tube. This would help explain the long duration static fire that Ship 34 completed.
With that long duration static fire SpaceX tested different thrust levels and flow levels through the propellant lines to find the setting that would’ve caused the harmonic oscillations. The loss of Ship 33 was a setback in the program, but SpaceX traditionally finds a way to come up with a solution and get back to flying in short order.
Flight 7 in Flight (Credit: BocaChicaGal for NSF)
Mission Objectives, Trajectory, Regulatory
The trajectory for Flight 8 will be the same as Flight 7 with a larger Notice to Airmen hazard zone due to the anomaly with Ship 33. Flight 8 will take off from Orbital Launch Pad A and target the Ship splashdown in the Indian Ocean like the past five Flights. The Booster is slated to return to the launch site for a fourth catch attempt. So far, SpaceX has landed in two out of three attempts.
The mission objectives for Flight 8 will be the same as those for Flight 7. Testing Block 2 thoroughly by completing an in-space Raptor engine burn like on Flight 6. Other significant tests are taking tiles off in locations across the vehicle to test what happens if a Ship loses a tile there on another mission. Testing new active cooled and metal tiles for different heat shield designs in the future.
SpaceX also needs to test all of the new systems onboard Block 2 that didn’t get tested with Ship 33 due to the anomaly. Lastly, this flight will test non-structural catch pins bolted onto the Ship. These pins have a slightly different design than what is currently on the Booster. The pins that would go into the landing rail are smaller, and both are covered in heat shield tiles to help survive reentry.
For Booster 15 its objectives are to have a successful flight and be caught. SpaceX needs to start reusing these vehicles to improve flight cadence this year.
Currently launch day is set for March 3, with a launch window at 5:30 pm to 6:30 pm CST. This is later than Flights 6 and 7 due to the sunrise being later in the ship landing zone for the ship heat shield imagery. SpaceX also has opportunities for March 4 – 7 according to Notice to Airmen (NOTAMs) advisories. Currently, there are only road closures set for March 3, 4, and 5, which start at 10:30 am and go until 11:00 pm CST.
The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) released a statement that SpaceX has completed a comprehensive safety review and can resume Starship flight operations, this is needed so that SpaceX can fly. At the same time, the mishap investigation is still open. The FAA issued a license modification for Flight 8 and beyond along with the flight sign-off.
From a regulatory standpoint, SpaceX is go for launch for Flight 8. pic.twitter.com/wvHsddwLP1
— Adrian Beil (@BCCarCounters) February 28, 2025
The first part of the modification allows for the installation of the flight termination system in the bays and removes it at the start of preflight operations. Instead, the start of preflight operations is now stated as starting with the GO/NO-GO poll before propellant loading.
The other modifications have to do with later Starship flights. These new modifications to the launch license authorize Starship to go into Orbit, however, it does not authorize Starship to reenter from Orbit. This will likely be added to the license once SpaceX proves Block 2’s heat shield and reentry systems during Flight 8.
Booster 15 and Ship 34
Ship 34 likely has many internal changes due to the loss of Ship 33. These changes would be improvements to the propellant lines going directly to the engines as well as software changes to prevent harmonic oscillation from occurring again. In terms of outside changes, there are extra vents in the aft section of the Ship to negate the issues encountered on Ship 33 during Flight 7.
Booster 15 On the Pad and Ready (Credit: Jack Beyer for NSF)
For Booster 15, SpaceX has stated that this Booster has upgraded avionics, which includes a more powerful flight computer. It also includes improved power and network distribution, such as an improved raceway and integrated smart batteries. These are improvements made from flight data and moving towards a Block 2 Booster.
Booster 15 was rolled out to the launch site on Feb 25 and has had a few days for final checkouts, but Ship 34 didn’t roll until March 2 at 10am CST, just 31 hours and 30 mins before launch. And was stacked around 8pm local time.
Flight 9
Assuming this is a perfect flight and SpaceX is confident with the results, then this flight could be the last suborbital hop SpaceX performs for now. As with the release of a Federal Communications Commission license for Flight 9, SpaceX has the option to return the ship to the launch site.
This would occur with Ship 35 and Booster 14-2. If Flight 8 does its job, this could make Flight 9 the most important Flight for the Starship Program to date.
Featured Image: Max Evans for NSF.
