Raumfahrt - Starship’s heat shield appears to have performed quite well in test

31.08.2025

"The latest upgrades are looking good!"

starship-2

A (stunning) view of SpaceX's Starship rocket shortly before splashing into the Indian Ocean this week. Credit: SpaceX

One of the more curious aspects of the 10th flight of SpaceX's Starship rocket on Tuesday was the striking orange discoloration of the second stage. This could be observed on video taken from a buoy near the landing site as the vehicle made a soft landing in the Indian Ocean.

This color—so different from the silvery skin and black tiles that cover Starship's upper stage—led to all sorts of speculation. Had heating damaged the stainless steel skin? Had the vehicle's tiles been shucked off, leaving behind some sort of orange adhesive material? Was this actually NASA's Space Launch System in disguise?

The answer to this question was rather important, as SpaceX founder Elon Musk had said before this flight that gathering data about the performance of this heat shield was the most important aspect of the mission.

We got some answers on Thursday. During the afternoon, the company posted some new high-resolution photos, taken by a drone in the vicinity of the landing location. They offered a clear view of the Starship vehicle with its heat shield intact, albeit with a rust-colored tint.

Musk provided some clarity on this discoloration on Thursday evening, writing on the social media site X, "Worth noting that the heat shield tiles almost entirely stayed attached, so the latest upgrades are looking good! The red color is from some metallic test tiles that oxidized and the white is from insulation of areas where we deliberately removed tiles."

The new images and information from Musk suggest that SpaceX is making progress on developing a heat shield for Starship. This really is the key technology to make an upper stage rapidly reusable—NASA's space shuttle orbiters were reusable but required a standing army to refurbish the vehicle between flights. To unlock Starship's potential, SpaceX wants to be able to refly Starships within 24 hours.

So what comes next?

Tuesday's test was largely successful. There appeared to be an issue with one of the Raptor engines in the upper stage later in the flight, which has not yet been detailed by the company. Damage to the engine bay and one of the vehicle's flaps can be seen clearly in the new photographs. This did not appear to impact what was a soft and precise landing in the Indian Ocean, but obviously it was not nominal.

So, with this new information, what does it mean for SpaceX's plans to test future Starship vehicles? What follows is a mixture of informed guesswork and reporting. It is also very notional because SpaceX is known to change its plans rapidly in response to new data. So take this information with a pinch of salt.

Flight Test 11: SpaceX has not revealed a profile for this flight test. It will almost certainly be the last Starship based on the version 2 design, which has been an interim step before the company moves to the larger V3 vehicle, with newer Raptor engines and design improvements. For this reason, it is likely that the 11th test remains suborbital, with the goal of demonstrating Raptor performance in space and testing additional changes to the heat shield. It may also fly a different or steeper reentry angle to further stress the heat shield. This test could occur in the October time frame.

Flight Test 12: This likely will be the first flight of the V3 Starship. Because of this, it will probably follow a suborbital trajectory. Why is SpaceX flying all of these suborbital missions? When Starship flies into orbit, the company wants to be sure it can control where and when it comes back to Earth. Starship is the largest human vehicle to ever return from space, and large chunks would survive an uncontrolled reentry. So SpaceX wants to be confident in its operation of Starship before orbiting the vehicle. Consequently, the first flight of V3 will probably be a standard suborbital test of the ship, booster, and heat shield. Expect this flight in early 2026.

Flight Test 13 and 14: These missions will likely continue to test Starship V3. Assuming flight test 12 goes well, we could probably see a booster catch attempt on flight 13 and probably the first orbital flight, complete with operational deployment of Starlink satellites in this range. This is clearly the most important interim goal the company is working toward, as these larger Starlinks should improve network speeds and performance and increase direct-to-device capabilities.

Flights 15 to 20: At some point, we'll stop calling them test flights. During this range of missions, we can expect to see SpaceX make its first attempt to catch a Starship upper stage (Musk said recently this could occur on flight 13 to 15, depending on how V3 flights go). Somewhere in here, SpaceX is also likely to launch two Starships to conduct an in-orbit refueling test, demonstrating the ability of two Starships to transfer propellant. This is a key step toward allowing Starships to go to the Moon (for NASA's Artemis Program) and Mars. At this point, I think it is safe to predict this test will occur no earlier than the second half of 2026.

Quelle: arsTechnica

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