On Tuesday, as the company occasionally does when facing what it deems to be unfair treatment, SpaceX posted a lengthy update decrying the decision. According to the firm, the FAA had assured it that Starship would get the green light this month. It claims the rocket has been ready to fly since early August, an assertion CEO Elon Musk reiterated last week.

“Unfortunately, we continue to be stuck in a reality where it takes longer to do the government paperwork to license a rocket launch than it does to design and build the actual hardware,” the firm said. “This should never happen and directly threatens America’s position as the leader in space.”

With the ability to be used multiple times on the cheap, Starship is expected to be a game-changer for U.S. spaceflight. SpaceX wants to launch the rocket up to 120 times per year from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center and Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida. Musk last week claimed the vehicle will reach Mars within two years.

SpaceX is also developing a Starship human landing system (HLS), a lunar lander variant of the spacecraft, for NASA’s Artemis III mission, which would return Americans to the moon for the first time in more than half a century. Starship will require a few more test flights before the mission, which is scheduled for late 2026.

That’s not much time, but SpaceX plans to get there using its philosophy of iterative design. Basically, the company puts flight hardware through real-world testing as often as possible to learn quickly and improve the chances of success on the next flight. The strategy helped it commercialize the now-ubiquitous Falcon rocket.

“The more we fly safely, the faster we learn; the faster we learn, the sooner we realize full and rapid rocket reuse,” SpaceX said.

Each Starship test flight has flown farther and accomplished more than the last. The fourth, in June, marked the first time both Starship and the Super Heavy booster made it back to Earth in one piece after the first two attempts ended in explosions.

Keeping with the trend, Flight 5 will feature the most ambitious goal yet. SpaceX will attempt to catch Super Heavy midair using two large “chopstick” arms, returning it safely to the Starbase launch pad in Boca Chica, Texas. 

The maneuver could pose risk to Starbase’s launch tower, but SpaceX says it has been preparing for years. The delay could create a ripple effect that hampers future Starship test flights. Safely returning the booster is a critical piece of the system’s reusability.

“It’s understandable that such a unique operation would require additional time to analyze from a licensing perspective,” the firm said. “Unfortunately, instead of focusing resources on critical safety analysis and collaborating on rational safeguards to protect both the public and the environment, the licensing process has been repeatedly derailed by issues ranging from the frivolous to the patently absurd.”

What’s the Holdup?

SpaceX said the FAA communicated that a launch license would be awarded this month, but the process has been delayed due to “four open environmental issues” it deems unnecessary.

Starship’s maiden voyage in April 2023 was a brief but bombastic one. The FAA grounded the rocket as it investigated the launch and explosion, which shook buildings, shattered windows, and sent ash and debris flying miles away.

The impact was more severe than SpaceX anticipated due to the lack of a flame deflector—a common fixture at launch sites that uses water to absorb energy and heat—beneath Starbase. According to Musk, the system was absent because it “wasn’t ready in time” and the company thought the pad could withstand the launch.

The FAA’s handling of Starship’s initial launch license prompted a lawsuit from five environmental groups, which the agency reportedly has sought to dismiss. With the flame deflector installed, subsequent Starship flights have not destroyed the launch pad.

However, the FAA has approved two 60-day consultations that could extend the timeline for a fifth mission.

According to SpaceX, the only proposed change to the mission’s hot-stage jettison—during which the top of the Super Heavy booster is expelled—is a new splashdown location, which it says would not raise the risk of harm to marine life. Still, the FAA signed off on a consultation with the National Marine Fisheries Service to evaluate the new site.

“SpaceX’s current license authorizing the Starship Flight 4 launch also allows for multiple flights of the same vehicle configuration and mission profile,” the agency told FLYING. “SpaceX chose to modify both for its proposed Starship Flight 5 launch which triggered a more in-depth review.”

SpaceX, though, fears the review could be longer.

“The mechanics of these types of consultations outline that any new questions raised during that time can reset the 60-day counter, over and over again,” it said.

A separate consultation with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS), requested by the FAA due to Flight 5’s larger sonic boom radius, could add to the delays. A sonic boom occurs as Starship slows from supersonic speeds on its way back to Earth.

“SpaceX submitted new information in mid-August detailing how the environmental impact of Flight 5 will cover a larger area than previously reviewed,” the FAA said. “This requires the FAA to consult with other agencies.”

According to SpaceX, both agencies have studied Starship booster landings and concluded there is no significant environmental impact from sonic booms. The firm also claims studies back the idea that sonic booms have no detrimental effect on wildlife—but the jury is still out on that one.

According to an evaluation by the California Coastal Commission of SpaceX’s request to increase Falcon 9 launches at Vandenberg Space Force Base in California, experts don’t fully understand the effects of noise on animals. The commission rejected the request in part because sonic booms generated by Falcon 9—a less powerful rocket than Starship—force too many closures and evacuations of local parks.

“At Starbase, we implement an extensive list of mitigations developed with federal and state agencies, many of which require year-round monitoring and frequent updates to regulators and consultation with independent biological experts,” SpaceX said.

Among other things, the company says it works with a local nonprofit to transport injured sea turtles for treatment and monitors bird local populations, using drones to search for nests before and after launch and. It also “adopted” Boca Chica Beach through a Texas state program and sponsors quarterly cleanups it says have removed hundreds of pounds of trash.

A CNBC report last month, which SpaceX swiftly rebuked, alleged that the company violated the Clean Water Act. The Environmental Protection Agency, though, told FLYING it did indeed violate that law.

Days before Starship’s third test flight in March, the EPA issued an order directing the company to eliminate “unpermitted discharges,” citing a liquid oxygen spill from the flame deflector’s water deluge system that seeped into the surrounding wetlands. SpaceX was forced to apply for a new permit from the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ), which it did in July, but still ate a fine of nearly $150,000 to resolve the violation.

In response, the company denied it ever discharged pollutants or operated the deluge system without TCEQ permission. According to SpaceX, the device uses “literal drinking water” and has been deemed safe by the FAA, TCEQ, and USFWS.

SpaceX further claimed that the EPA issued its order without knowledge of its TCEQ license or “a basic understanding of the facts” of the system’s operation. It added that the fines are “entirely tied to disagreements over paperwork” and stem from a simple misunderstanding.

“We chose to settle so that we can focus our energy on completing the missions and commitments that we have made to the U.S. government, commercial customers, and ourselves,” SpaceX said. “Paying fines is extremely disappointing when we fundamentally disagree with the allegations, and we are supported by the fact that EPA has agreed that nothing about the operation of our flame deflector will need to change. Only the name of the permit has changed.”

The proposed settlement is open for public comment until October 21.

Singled Out?

The implication by SpaceX is that it is being unfairly targeted for its successes.

The company is prolific within the commercial spaceflight industry—experts estimate it accounted for 87 percent of all spacecraft mass space operators sent into orbit in 2023. At the same time, it handles more NASA missions than any of the agency’s private contractors.

That dominance occasionally draws ire from competitors such as Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin, or, as SpaceX puts it, “bad-faith hysterics from online detractors or special interest groups.”

“Despite a small, but vocal, minority of detractors trying to game the regulatory system to obstruct and delay the development of Starship, SpaceX remains committed to the mission at hand,” the company said.

NASA has made it known that it intends to become one of many customers within a commercial space ecosystem, rather than a service provider, by the end of the decade. As SpaceX continues to snap up NASA contracts—including an agreement to deorbit the International Space Station, ushering in that new era—rivals and critics may fear that its supremacy will only grow.

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Last week, Blue Origin filed a public comment to the FAA requesting that the regulator limit the number of launches of SpaceX’s Starship—the largest and most powerful rocket ever built—out of Launch Complex-39A at Kennedy Space Center in Florida, which currently hosts the company’s Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy rockets.

The FAA in May released a SpaceX proposal for high-frequency Starship operations at Kennedy, including the construction of infrastructure that would allow Musk’s firm to complete 44 launches per year.

The filing is the latest wrinkle in the multiyear feud between Musk and Bezos, who have exchanged taunts and legal actions as they battle for supremacy in the commercial spaceflight industry. Both SpaceX and Blue Origin have obtained contracts from U.S. government agencies such as NASA and the Pentagon and intend to make cosmic tourism a piece of their business.

“Sue Origin,” Musk bantered on social media platform X, which he acquired in 2022.

In a subsequent post, the SpaceX boss added, “An obviously disingenuous response. Not cool of them to try (for the third time) to impede SpaceX’s progress by lawfare.”

The public comment filed by Blue Origin has no legal bearing, but the FAA will consider it as it determines what restrictions to place on Starship at Kennedy.

SpaceX is seeking a commercial launch vehicle operator license for Starship operations at Launch Complex 39-A, which will require the preparation of an environmental impact statement (EIS). The EIS describes the potential effects of those operations on the surrounding environment and was required for SpaceX to begin the Starship orbital test flight program, for example. SpaceX will prepare the assessment itself under FAA supervision.

During Starship’s maiden voyage, which ended in a ball of flames a few minutes into the mission, the impact from the launch caused unexpected damage as far as 6 miles away from the Starbase launchpad in Boca Chica, Texas. The force of Starship broke windows, sent ashy debris into the sky, and brought an FAA investigation into SpaceX’s environmental mitigations, grounding the rocket for months. Five environmental groups sued the FAA over its handling of the mission.

Since then, SpaceX has made several improvements to Starbase to contain Starship’s debris field, and subsequent missions have resulted in little fanfare. However, it appears Blue Origin will use the incident as leverage in its plea to the FAA.

“At Starbase, Starship and Super Heavy test missions have been subject to environmental scrutiny due to their impact on the local environment and community,” the public comment reads, citing the aforementioned lawsuit against the regulator as evidence.

Blue Origin too launches operations out of Kennedy. The company leases Space Launch Complex-36 and occupies several hangars, as well as a manufacturing site, at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station (CCSFS), which it says are close to the area SpaceX wants to use.

“Blue Origin employs over 2,700 full-time employees in [Florida’s] Brevard County, including 449 employees at CCSFS that are directly impacted by local launch activities,” the filing reads. “Blue Origin has invested more than $1 billion in capital expenditures to develop [Launch Complex-36] as the first privately built heavy-lift launch complex in the world.”

The company said it worries about the safety of property and personnel during a Starship launch anomaly, such as an explosion, fire, debris, or loud noise. It also argued that Starship operations could impede Blue Origin’s access to shared infrastructure and “limited airspace and maritime resources.”

Starship and the Super Heavy booster hold about 5,200 metric tons of liquid methane for propulsion—the force of which, Blue Origin claims, would impede company and government activities at Kennedy due to the anticipated requirement of a safety margin around the site.

The firm urged the FAA to place a cap on the number of Starship launches, specify and limit launch times, and invest in infrastructure that would make Kennedy and CCSFS safer and more accessible for other launch providers.

It also suggested that SpaceX and the government be required to compensate Blue Origin or other companies whose commercial activities are impacted by Starship, as well as mandatory penalties for SpaceX should it violate the EIS or its license.

Given Bezos’ history with Musk, it’s difficult to say whether genuine concern, a desire to hamper the competition, or both prompted the comment.

Blue Origin is developing an alternative to Starship, New Glenn, but the rocket has faced delays and has yet to fly. New Glenn has collected a handful of customers, including Amazon’s Project Kuiper and NASA, which intends to launch it to Mars on its maiden voyage later this year.

NASA was at the center of the most publicized dispute between Blue Origin and SpaceX. After the space agency tapped SpaceX as the sole provider of a human landing system (HLS) for Artemis missions to the moon, Bezos in 2021 took NASA to court, arguing that it had promised two contracts.

The company would ultimately lose that battle. But the space agency in 2023 announced Blue Origin as the second Artemis HLS provider. Both companies are now working with NASA to develop a revamped plan for the Mars Sample Return Program, each receiving a $1.5 million contract.

The firms are also competing in the military sphere. In 2022, Blue Origin lost out on a pair of Pentagon contracts at the expense of SpaceX and United Launch Alliance, a joint venture between Boeing and Lockheed Martin. But earlier this month, it secured its own agreement with the U.S. Space Force for 30 military launches, worth up to $5.6 billion.

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Starship and the Super Heavy booster finally made it back to Earth following the spacecraft’s fourth integrated flight test (IFT-4), which was the main goal of the mission that launched from Boca Chica, Texas. As SpaceX put it, “the payload for this test was the data.”

Super Heavy splashed down in the Gulf of Mexico after jettisoning from Starship about four minutes into the flight. Starship, meanwhile, flew nearly halfway around the world over the course of about 40 minutes before splashing down in the Indian Ocean.

External cameras and on board Starlink satellites gave viewers a rare live look at Starship’s reentry into Earth’s atmosphere from its suborbital flight path. The video feed appeared to show the loss of several heat shield tiles and damage to one of the flaps—which control the vehicle as it decelerates from hypersonic speeds—as plasma built up around the spacecraft.

Live footage cut in and out several times, prompting cheers from the SpaceX team each time the feed was restored. Crews toasted marshmallows in celebration of Starship’s inaugural landing burn, which slowed it down for a “soft” ocean landing. Then, finally, after much anticipation, the gargantuan spacecraft splashed down for the first time at T-plus 1 hour and 6 minutes.

“Despite loss of many tiles and a damaged flap, Starship made it all the way to a soft landing in the ocean!” said SpaceX CEO Elon Musk in a post on X, the social media platform he acquired in 2022. “Congratulations @SpaceX team on an epic achievement!!”

NASA Administrator Bill Nelson, who is betting on Starship to complete the necessary test flights in time for SpaceX to prepare a Starship Human Landing System (HLS) for the Artemis III mission—NASA’s first lunar landing attempt since the Apollo missions—also sang the praises of IFT-4.

After successfully making it to suborbit and back, the arrow is pointing up for Starship.

Each of the spacecraft’s first two integrated test flights ended in explosions, and its third was cut short just after reentering the atmosphere. All three attempts resulted in the spacecraft’s grounding by the FAA.

But SpaceX painted these as successes. According to the company, Starship’s development falls under its philosophy of rapid design iteration. Essentially, the firm is okay with blowing up a few rockets if it can collect data that helps it hone the design, increasing the chances of success on future launches.

A reentry and soft landing was the primary objective of Thursday’s flight test, validating that Starship and Super Heavy—which are designed to be reusable—could survive the extreme conditions during approach and landing.

At present, it’s unclear whether the extent of the damage will prevent the rocket from flying again. But with both stages back on Earth, it seems unlikely that the FAA would move to ground Starship for a fourth time.

“The fourth flight of Starship made major strides to bring us closer to a rapidly reusable future,” SpaceX said in an update on its website. “Its accomplishments will provide data to drive improvements as we continue rapidly developing Starship into a fully reusable transportation system designed to carry crew and cargo to Earth orbit, the moon, Mars, and beyond.”

That would mean Musk and SpaceX can turn to the next step in Artemis preparations: an in-orbit propellant transfer demonstration. Following that, Starship will need to complete an uncrewed lunar landing, which could require multiple launches.

The final phase will be a crewed flight test, in which the spacecraft will land billionaire entrepreneur Jared Isaacman on the moon. Isaacman is the driving force behind the Polaris Program, which in 2022 purchased three flights from SpaceX in an effort to advance human spaceflight. The program’s first mission, Polaris Dawn, is expected to launch this summer on SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket. It will culminate in the crewed flight of Starship.

It’s difficult to gauge exactly how many Starship launches SpaceX will need to complete before the rocket is certified for routine missions. But the company is under a time crunch.

Already, Artemis III has been pushed back from 2025 to September 2026. And NASA, facing competition from Russia, China, and others to expand the envelope for human spaceflight, will likely want to stick to that timeline.

If that’s the case, SpaceX will need to see continued positive results from rapid design interaction. The good news is that Starship appears to be on the right trajectory.

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The company’s massive rocket and Super Heavy booster, which when stacked together stand nearly 400 feet tall, have been grounded since March as the FAA conducts a mishap investigation into Starship’s third uncrewed orbital test flight.

However, Musk on Saturday posted an image to social media platform X—which he acquired in October 2022—of Starship and Super Heavy being moved back to the company’s Starbase launchpad in Boca Chica, Texas, which hosted the rocket’s first three test flights.

In response to a query about the date of the fourth flight, called Integrated Flight Test 4 or IFT-4, Musk gave a timeline of three to five weeks. That would place the next launch sometime in June.

SpaceX has a hit-or-miss track record when it comes to predicting Starship launches. Gwynne Shotwell, the company’s chief operating officer, said in March for example that IFT-4 could launch as soon as early May.

During the lead-up to Starship’s second test flight, which ultimately launched in November, Musk gave a timeline of six to eight weeks in April and again in June. In September, he said the rocket was “ready to launch” and was swiftly rebuffed by the FAA. However, on November 3, SpaceX correctly predicted that Starship would launch again by the middle of the month.

Starship’s three test flights have improved on each attempt but resulted in groundings of varying lengths by the FAA. The agency’s initial investigation spanned from April to November. The second took half as long, wrapping up between November and February.

Given the improvements made to Starship and Starbase before the rocket’s second flight test—such as the installation of a water-cooled steel plate beneath the launch pad to contain debris—and the relative success of its third flight test, SpaceX could be looking at a similar timeline of around three months for the current investigation. That would put it in line to close in June, making Musk’s prediction appear feasible.

Musk and SpaceX have already set ambitious goals for Starship’s fourth flight. The biggest will be to survive reentry into Earth’s atmosphere, which is where the previous mission failed. Both Starship and the Super Heavy booster are designed to be reusable.

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The agency says it plans to prepare an environmental impact statement (EIS) on the potential effects of awarding a commercial launch vehicle operator license for Starship operations at Kennedy’s Launch Complex-39A. To date, all Starship test flights have launched from SpaceX’s Starbase launchpad in Boca Chica, Texas, which serves as its primary research, development, and flight test facility for the gargantuan rocket.

SpaceX will need to obtain a vehicle operator license before launching Starship from Kennedy, an action that falls under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), the FAA says. As such, it and NASA determined an EIS to be the appropriate level of scrutiny. 

SpaceX will prepare the assessment itself under FAA supervision, at NASA’s request. Obtaining the EIS would not guarantee the issuance of a vehicle operator license, but it is a required step under NEPA.

SpaceX’s proposal calls for the construction of launch, landing, and other infrastructure at Launch Complex-39A that would support as many as 44 launches per year using Starship and the company’s Super Heavy booster. The site hosts launches of its Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy rockets.

The new infrastructure would allow Starship—which is designed to be reusable—to land back on the launchpad or a droneship, a sea-borne landing platform. The proposal also calls for expendable rocket and booster landings in the Atlantic Ocean.

The FAA will hold one virtual and three in-person public scoping meetings, inviting relevant agencies and organizations, local Native American tribes, and members of the public to submit comments on the potential environmental impacts of the proposal.

The submission period for public comments opened Friday with the publication in the Federal Register of an FAA notice of intent to prepare the EIS. Stakeholders can attend in-person scoping meetings on June 12 and 13, followed by a virtual meeting on June 17. More information is available on the FAA website.

Starship so far has flown three uncrewed orbital test flights, each more successful than the last. However, the first of those flights, which launched in April 2023, caused a litany of unintended environmental effects, shattering windows and sending plumes of ashy particulate as far as 6 miles away from Starbase.

The debris field created by the launch had a far wider radius than anticipated, due in part to SpaceX’s decision to forgo the installation of a water-cooled steel plate beneath the launchpad. A water deluge system was installed for Starship’s second test flight, which greatly improved containment of the debris field.

Following Starship’s first test flight, a coalition of environmental groups also sued the FAA over its handling of the launch. The groups accuse the agency of allowing SpaceX to take the reins on evaluating the rocket’s environmental impact.

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