SpaceX Launches Starship’s Seventh Flight Test (& Completes Second Successful Booster Catch!), Subsequently Loses Contact with Ship

(Boca Chica, Texas) The seventh flight test of SpaceX’s Starship launched today at 5.37pm ET / 4.37pm CT (2237 GMT) from the company’s Starbase in Boca Chica, Texas; post-launch, SpaceX successfully completed its second booster catch, with a set of giant robotic arms catching the rocket's first stage, before contact with the ship was lost approximately 8.5 minutes into the flight.

Photo of SpaceX's second successful booster catch, following the launch of its seventh Starship flight test this afternoon, courtesy of SpaceX's livestream on X via @spacex.

While in flight, post-Stage One, Starship lost communication with ground - SpaceX's livestream on X via @spacex is currently waiting for more information about the status of the ship, as of 5.50pm EST (2250 GMT).

Today's flight test was intended to launch the new generation Starship with significant upgrades, attempt Starship’s first payload deployment test, fly multiple reentry experiments geared toward catch and reuse and launch and return the Super Heavy booster, according to a post on SpaceX’s website.

While in space, Starship is intended to deploy 10 Starlink simulators - which are similar in size and weight to the next-generation Starlink Satellites - as the first exercise of a satellite deploy mission.

“The Starlink simulators will be on the same suborbital trajectory as Starship and are expected to demise upon entry,” reads SpaceX’s website post. “A relight of a single Raptor engine while in space is also planned.”

SpaceX’s goals for Starship in 2025 involve bringing reuse of the entire system online and “flying increasingly ambitious missions as we iterate towards being able to send humans and cargo to Earth orbit, the Moon, and Mars,” according to the company.

Photo of Starship in flight courtesy of SpaceX's livestream on X via @spacex.

As for today’s flight test, per SpaceX, some of the upgrades to Starship’s upper stage which debuted on Flight Test 7 include:

• “The vehicle’s forward flaps have been reduced in size and shifted towards the vehicle tip and away from the heat shield, significantly reducing their exposure to reentry heating while simplifying the underlying mechanisms and protective tiling.
• Redesigns to the propulsion system, including a 25 percent increase in propellant volume, the vacuum jacketing of feedlines, a new fuel feedline system for the vehicle’s Raptor vacuum engines, and an improved propulsion avionics module controlling vehicle valves and reading sensors — all add additional vehicle performance and the ability to fly longer missions.
• The ship’s heat shield will also use the latest generation tiles and includes a backup layer to protect from missing or damaged tiles.”