SpaceX's Starship completes 13th test flight, deploys 20 satellites and lands safely

SpaceX launched the 13th test flight of its Starship megarocket on Friday, July 24, from the Starbase facility in South Texas. The 408-foot (124-meter) Starship Version 3 vehicle lifted off on the Super Heavy booster and, after stage separation, the upper stage deployed 20 next-generation Starlink satellites as planned. The spacecraft also performed a scheduled in-space re-ignition of a Raptor engine and later splashed down in the Indian Ocean off the coast of Western Australia without exploding, marking the first soft water landing for the vehicle.

"The vehicle hit all of its marks, successfully deploying 20 next-gen Starlink satellites, re-igniting one of its Raptor engines in space as planned and splashing down softly off the coast of Western Australia," SpaceX said in its post-flight summary.

The company shared live footage of the launch and later posted images and video clips on its X account, showing the Super Heavy booster separating and the Starship descending toward the ocean. Drone footage captured the splashdown and the subsequent fire around the vehicle's nose.

Both the Starship and Super Heavy boosters are intended to be fully reusable, with future flights aiming to recover each stage at the launch site using tower-mounted capture arms. SpaceX has previously recovered the Super Heavy booster on three test flights and plans to attempt recovery of the Starship vehicle on the upcoming Flight 14, pending data review from Flight 13.

The Flight 13 mission was the second launch of the Version 3 configuration, the first iteration designed for operational use following the program’s inaugural test flight in April 2023.