SpaceX will try to put Starship in orbit for the first time on September 22

SpaceX will try to put Starship in orbit for the first time on September 22. Cardenas/AFP / Getty Images Space SpaceX will try to put Starship in orbit for the first time on September 22 Sean O'Kane 11:16 AM PDT · September 15, 2026 SpaceX is ready to perform the 14th test flight of its Starship mega-rocket, and now the company will finally try to put the upper stage into Earth’s orbit for the first time, the company announced Tuesday.

What happened

Founder and CEO Elon Musk has said that will happen once Starship is flying “reliably several times per week” to save “scarce SpaceX engineering and production resources. ” SpaceX needs Starship to reliably reach orbit, return to Earth, and get quickly reused to fulfill the massive launch cadence promises that it made during the IPO process. The first came in July, when SpaceX successfully deployed V3 Starlink satellites for the first time — though those were only meant to test Starship’s deployment capability and burned up in Earth’s atmosphere after roughly 20 minutes.

Getting Starship’s upper stage into orbit around Earth would represent a major milestone for SpaceX. If successful, this will be the first Starship launch to generate revenue for SpaceX’s launch division (even if that revenue is coming from another division of the company). This will be the second Starship test launch since SpaceX became a publicly traded company in the largest IPO in history in June. Musk recently walked back previous claims that SpaceX might try to use its launch tower to catch the Starship upper stage during this flight, saying an explosion would be too big a setback for the company at this point.

SpaceX also won’t try to catch the Super Heavy booster this time.

The wider picture

For this mission, SpaceX said Tuesday that it made another round of “several modifications” to the booster’s hardware and software to “address issues seen on the previous flight. ” SpaceX had far more success with the upper stage of Starship on Flight 13. SpaceX said Tuesday that it has made additional changes to the Starship heat shield based on what it learned from studying the recovered upper stage from Flight 13. Topics Elon Musk, Space, SpaceX, Starship When you purchase through links in our articles, we may earn a small commission.

S. has acknowledged for the first time having weapons in orbit. S. said for the first time Monday that the Space Force has deployed weapons in orbit. Elon Musk's company will also attempt to deploy the first V3 Starlink satellites into its orbital internet constellation. The test launch is scheduled for September 22, with a 75-minute launch window opening at 7:15 a. m. During the test launch, SpaceX plans to deploy the first batch of third-generation Starlinks into its network of 10,000 internet satellites.

What has been reported

The company expects to launch 26 V3 satellites into orbit in this test flight. The company has spent billions of dollars on the program and is now looking to retire its Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy rockets in favor of Starship. Starship’s 14th test flight will only test the first part of that equation, though. Yet the booster still struggled to properly relight its engines after separating from the Starship upper stage on Flight 13 in July.

While it did not reach orbit, it had a smooth flight through a simulated landing in the Indian Ocean. The upper stage didn’t even explode when it tipped over into the water, allowing SpaceX to spend the last few months capturing and slowly towing it back to its Texas headquarters. View Bio October 13 – 15 San Francisco Last day to book an exhibit table is September 18. Air Force Secretary Troy Meink said Monday that "on-orbit space control weapons" were capable of protecting U.

What happens next

S. has "on-orbit space control weapons," as he outlined a broader push to modernize the Air Force and Space Force in response to advances by U. The only thing that we know is that it is based in space, so this is not a sort of missile based on Earth that could hit a satellite in orbit. S. orbital weapon capability, Suess said, adding that it comes after years of counterspace development and testing by the U.

Boosted by the successful public listing of SpaceX earlier this year – the largest IPO ever – investors are increasingly looking to place bets on the growing commercial space economy. Disrupt 2026: OpenAI, Anthropic, Replit, and more take over 6 industry stages. 25% off tickets now Back by popular demand: Save up to $300 on Disrupt Close Image Credits:Gabriel V. The company has struggled with the booster during its last few test flights and has made multiple changes to try to prevent failures.

The report has been compiled by The Daily Waves using information reported across techcrunch.com, bbc.co.uk, cnbc.com. Details are presented according to the information available at the time of publication and may change as authorities, organisers or other relevant parties provide updates.