SpaceX has moved the Super Heavy booster, the first stage of its colossal Starship rocket, to the launch pad at the company’s Starbase facility in South Texas, signaling preparations for the next major test flight.
SpaceX rolled out the Starship Flight 11 Super Heavy booster to the launch pad at its Starbase site in South Texas Credit: SpaceX
The rollout, which took place Wednesday (Oct. 8), was shared in a series of striking photos posted by SpaceX on X (formerly Twitter). The images show the massive booster being carefully transported to and mounted atop the orbital launch platform—a familiar sight at Starbase as SpaceX continues its rapid testing campaign for the world’s largest rocket.
The 11th integrated test flight of Starship is currently targeted for Monday, Oct. 13, at 7:15 p.m. EDT (2315 GMT). Viewers will be able to watch the launch live, with streaming coverage provided by SpaceX .
Towering nearly 400 feet (121 meters) tall, Starship is the most powerful launch vehicle ever built—and, according to SpaceX founder and CEO Elon Musk, future versions will be even taller and more capable.
The fully reusable rocket system consists of two stages:
- Super Heavy, the 33-engine booster that provides the thrust to escape Earth’s gravity, and
- Starship, or simply “Ship,” the upper-stage spacecraft powered by six Raptor engines.
Both components are designed to be rapidly reusable, a key element in SpaceX’s long-term vision to lower launch costs and enable large-scale missions to the Moon and Mars.
Newly released images highlight the dense cluster of Raptor engines beneath the Super Heavy booster—an engineering feat that represents the heart of SpaceX’s push toward next-generation propulsion.
Flight 11: Testing Reusability and Payload Deployment
The Flight 11 mission will follow a similar profile to the highly successful Flight 10, which launched on Aug. 26 and marked a milestone for Starship’s development program.
For this upcoming flight, the Super Heavy booster will separate after liftoff and perform a controlled splashdown in the Gulf of Mexico. It will be the second reentry for this particular booster, which also flew during Flight 8 in March. That earlier mission included a dramatic “catch” attempt by Starbase’s mechanical “chopstick” arms—a maneuver that will not be attempted on Flight 11 as engineers focus on continued data collection and reentry refinement.
Meanwhile, the Starship upper stage will carry eight payloads, consisting of non-functional test versions of SpaceX’s Starlink internet satellites, designed to simulate a real deployment sequence. After completing its orbital objectives, Ship will perform a targeted reentry and splashdown in the Indian Ocean.
Each successive Starship flight has brought SpaceX closer to achieving a fully reusable super-heavy launch system—a key requirement for Musk’s ambitious plans to enable human settlement on Mars and support NASA’s Artemis program for lunar exploration.
If successful, Flight 11 will add to the growing list of milestones demonstrating Starship’s progress, reinforcing SpaceX’s position at the forefront of next-generation spaceflight.
SpaceX’s live webcast will begin shortly before liftoff on Monday evening, offering viewers around the world a front-row seat to the next chapter in Starship’s rapidly evolving story.
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