SpaceX Starship launches on 1st orbital attempt

Richard Tribou, Orlando Sentinel on Sep 28, 2026

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SpaceX launched its Starship and Super Heavy rocket on Monday morning on what could be its first orbital flight ever.

Liftoff from the company’s Texas launch site Starbase of the heavy-lift rocket came at 8:46 a.m. EDT.

“Things are looking really good right now,” said SpaceX commentator Dan Huot.

The orbital attempt on what is the 14th launch attempt of the most powerful rocket to ever launch could pave the way for operational launches later this year from Kennedy Space Center where the company has been building a launch tower at Launch Complex 39-A.

The 33 Raptor engines on the Super Heavy booster create nearly 17 million pounds of thrust on liftoff, which is nearly double that of NASA’s Space Launch System rocket used on Artemis missions.

Starship has a flight plan that also includes deploying what would be the first operational Starlink V3 satellites in its massive constellation.

The company did not attempt a recovery of the Super Heavy booster on land as it had done three times previous, but instead brought it down for a controlled landing over water off Texas’ Gulf coast.

The upper stage Starship goal is make six orbits around the planet over 10 hours and an eventual splashdown in the Pacific Ocean off the west coast of Chile.

The Starship upper stage has six Raptor engines, but one went out before it made it to space.

One engine out could drive SpaceX to not try for the orbital attempt, though.

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