Starship Flight Test 11

Space X is about to launch Starship Flight Test 11 from Texas today. The plan for this launch is pretty similar to flight 10 but with some specific changes designed to test new approaches to landing and new heat tile tech on a booster that is being reflown today. This will also be the last flight for launch pad 1 (A) and for the Block 2 design of Starship.

With Flight 11 comes the end of Starship flight tests out of Pad 1(A), and it is the final Block 1 or 2 vehicle to fly for the program. This send-off might be bittersweet, as these past 10 flights have held many memories, and Pad 1(A) has played a crucial role in advancing this program to this point…

Pad 1(A) suffered severe damage during Flight 1, as SpaceX had yet to install the water-cooled steel plate and was only using concrete under it. This resulted in a volcano-like explosion of concrete when the engines dug a hole into the foundation…

The vehicles for this flight are Booster 15-2 and Ship 38, and as stated above, these are the last Block 2 Starship vehicles to fly for this program. Block 2 has been a hit and miss for SpaceX; the booster has performed nearly perfectly with Boosters 14, 15, and 16, all of which completed their missions. Notably, Booster 14 has been reflown, and Booster 15 is slated to refly on this flight.

Space X is already building the next phase of Starships for future test flights.

Right now, we’re actively building multiple next-generation V3 Starship and Super Heavy vehicles, incorporating learnings from every flight test pic.twitter.com/ivoN0Mqm2C

— SpaceX (@SpaceX) October 13, 2025

Today, the reused booster (with all reused engines) will simulate a landing over the ocean and then drop into the water, similar to the last flight. No tower catch planned for today. As for the ship itself…

The Starship upper stage will target multiple in-space objectives, including the deployment of eight Starlink simulators, similar in size to next-generation Starlink satellites. The Starlink simulators will be on the same suborbital trajectory as Starship and are expected to demise upon entry. A relight of a single Raptor engine while in space is also planned.

The flight test includes several experiments and operational changes focused on enabling Starship’s upper stage to return to the launch site on future flights. For reentry, tiles have been removed from Starship to intentionally stress-test vulnerable areas across the vehicle. Several of the missing tiles are in areas where tiles are bonded to the vehicle and do not have a backup ablative layer. To mimic the path a ship will take on future flights returning to Starbase, the final phase of Starship’s trajectory on Flight 11 includes a dynamic banking maneuver and will test subsonic guidance algorithms prior to a landing burn and splashdown in the Indian Ocean.

Elon Musk made a surprise visit during the livestream. He said he was going to be watching the launch from outside today instead of from Mission Control.

Elon Musk just made a surprise appearance on tonight’s Starship livestream: pic.twitter.com/UFFqofrdwO

— Sawyer Merritt (@SawyerMerritt) October 13, 2025

I’ll post the entire launch video below but if you just want to see the exciting bits, here’s the successful launch.

Liftoff of Starship! pic.twitter.com/sbfmGAEPa6

— SpaceX (@SpaceX) October 13, 2025

And here is stage separation.

Starship’s Raptor engines ignite during hot-staging separation. Super Heavy is boosting back towards its splashdown site and preparing for its landing burn experiment pic.twitter.com/oCy90IFitO

— SpaceX (@SpaceX) October 13, 2025

And another successful simulated landing over water. This time they used five engines instead of just 3 to slow the booster faster (which apparently uses less fuel). This looks like a complete success. The booster hovers over the water and then drops once the engines are cut.

Super Heavy has splashed down in the Gulf of America, gathering data for the next generation booster pic.twitter.com/o72ciKBZYm

— SpaceX (@SpaceX) October 13, 2025

Meanwhile, Starship continued into space and has successfully reached a coasting phase.

Starship’s ascent burn is complete and is now coasting through space pic.twitter.com/UrNg19ElX5

— SpaceX (@SpaceX) October 13, 2025

There should be an attempt to launch simulated Starlink satellites. That seems to be happening as I write this.

If there are any surprises they will probably come as the ship attempts another simulated landing over the Indian Ocean. So far, this looks like a complete success, similar to the last launch. Here’s the live view if you want to catch the landing.

Watch Starship’s eleventh flight test → https://t.co/YmvmGZTV8o
https://t.co/zIRMX5mh9K

— SpaceX (@SpaceX) September 29, 2025

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