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20/11/23
Starship Test Launch No.2
Space rockets have been used for over 60 years, to get astronauts up into space as well as launching uncrewed missions too. Rockets were unfortunately invented during the second world war. The V2 rocket was the first rocket to be able to leave Earths atmosphere and enter space. It was used in 1942 by the Nazis as a weapon though so it would leave Earths atmosphere to then come straight back down and crash like a bomb. In 1957 the technology was used in a much more positive way and the first rocket launched a satellite up into space. In 1969 Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin even managed to walk on the Moon, taken up to space in a Saturn V rocket.
At one stage Space Shuttles were used and these were reusable, unlike rockets. The first one launched in 1981 but due to safety problems space shuttles were retired in 2011. Now improved rockets are being developed, the latest being called the Starship Mega Rocket!
In November last year NASA launched the SLS Rocket for the first time successfully, a new powerful rocket system that they hope will help to get men back to the Moon and potentially beyond.
This weekend SpaceX launched their new space rocket, the Starship Mega Rocket. They have similar hopes for it that NASA has for the SLS Rocket. In fact, because getting a new rocket to the Moon is so incredibly expensive NASA hopes they might be able to potentially use the SpaceX rocket as part of their mission to the Moon, as SpaceX is a private company so doesn’t cost the American government so much money.
This was the second uncrewed test flight for the Starship Mega Rocket. Unfortunately, just like the first test flight back in April (when there was an explosion after just four minutes) things didn’t quite go to plan…which is why they do test flights in the first place. No astronauts go up in rockets in these early test flights just to be safe.
On this test flight SpaceX wanted the rocket to launch and then go 150 miles up into the air and travel around the globe once before landing back safely down into the Pacific Ocean about 90 minutes later.
Starship Mega Rocket
The SpaceX Starship mega rocket is the largest and most powerful space rocket ever built. It is made up of two parts, the Super Heavy Booster and the Starship Spacecraft. The whole thing is 118 metres tall, which is taller than any other space rockets built before it.
Unlike other rockets that could only be used once, the parts of the Starship rockets will be reusable and be able to be used multiple times. The Super Heavy Booster, with its 33 engines will give the rocket the power to launch and leave Earth’s atmosphere then disconnect and land back at the launch site. The Starship Spacecraft will then carry on into space, using 6 engines suitable for the vacuum of space, even having the ability to refuel on the move so it can travel further.
It is hoped by SpaceX that eventually the Starship Mega Rocket will be used to return astronauts to the Moon and even further, potentially for the first missions to Mars! Wouldn’t that be amazing!
Launch No.2
The first part of the launch on Friday, which was in Texas in America, went well. The Super Heavy Booster did its job launching the rocket out of the Earth’s atmosphere and then separated correctly. Unfortunately shortly after it then exploded which was not the plan. Then just after this, mission control lost contact with the second part of the rocket, the Starship Spacecraft. It is believed something triggered the spacecrafts automatic termination system and it self destructed, exploding too.
The whole thing was over in about eight minutes, but that was still a better result than in April when the whole rocket exploded after four minutes and the two parts were unable to separate or leave Earth’s atmosphere to reach space. SpaceX said they made over a thousand changes to the Starship Mega Rocket between Test Launch 1 and 2. Now they will go away and make more changes before they try again.
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Creative Common Images in this post…
Starship Mission by Official SpaceX Photos is licensed under CC BY-NC 2.0 DEED