LOS ANGELES, July 13 (Xinhua) -- SpaceX is targeting Thursday for the 13th flight test of its giant Starship rocket, the company announced on Monday.
The 90-minute launch window is scheduled to open at 5:45 p.m. U.S. Central Time.
The mission will continue testing the Version 3 Starship and Super Heavy vehicles. The booster's primary objectives include a successful launch, ascent, stage separation, boostback burn and landing burn before splashing down at an offshore landing site in the Gulf of Mexico, according to SpaceX.
The Starship upper stage will attempt to deploy 20 next-generation Starlink V3 satellites, relight a single Raptor engine in space, and conduct another controlled reentry, descent and splashdown in the Indian Ocean.
The flight will also test several upgrades and experiments related to Starship's heat shield as SpaceX continues developing a fully and rapidly reusable launch system.
SpaceX conducted Starship's 12th flight test on May 22. During that mission, the Super Heavy booster failed to complete its planned boostback burn after stage separation and later made a hard splashdown in the Gulf of Mexico, according to the company.
Following the test, the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) required SpaceX to conduct a mishap investigation into the booster's failure.
The FAA announced on Monday that the investigation has been closed, clearing the way for Flight 13 to proceed, provided all safety and licensing requirements are met.
According to the FAA, it oversaw and accepted the findings and corrective actions from the SpaceX-led investigation. The final mishap report identified two most probable root causes for the loss of the Super Heavy booster: heat effects on propulsion system components during ascent and erroneous engine alarm system settings.
The FAA said SpaceX has identified four corrective actions, including hardware and software configuration updates, to prevent a recurrence of the incident. ■