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SpaceX is scheduled to launch the seventh test flight of its Starship megarocket on Thursday (January 16), and you can watch it live.
The 400-foot-tall (122-meter) Starship is scheduled to lift off from SpaceX’s Starbase site in south Texas on Thursday at 5 p.m. ET (10 p.m. GMT, 4 p.m. local time in Texas).
You can watch the action live on Space.com, courtesy of SpaceX. Or you can view it directly via the company. Coverage will begin approximately 35 minutes before the launch.
Starship is the largest and most powerful rocket ever built. It consists of two stages, both of which are designed for complete and rapid reuse. A giant booster called the Super Heavy and a 165-foot (50-meter) tall spacecraft known as the Starship or simply the Ship.
RELATED: SpaceX’s Starship Flight 7 test flight deploys mock Starlink satellites for the first time
Starship has flown six times so far, twice in 2023 and in March, June, October and November of last year. The October mission featured an unprecedented capture of a super heavy by the launcher’s “chopstick” arm. SpaceX hopes to repeat this feat with today’s flight.
But the company is planning something new for Flight 7 as well. If all goes as planned, the ship will deploy 10 simulated versions of SpaceX’s Starlink internet satellites. These dummy spacecraft don’t stay in space for long. They will follow the ship’s orbit and splash down in the Indian Ocean about an hour after liftoff. (SpaceX plans to eventually capture Shipp with its chopstick arms, but it won’t try to do so on Flight 7.)
Today’s flight will likely be Starship’s first flight in 2025. SpaceX plans to make serious progress on the giant rocket in the coming weeks and months.
“This new year will be a transformational year for Starship, with the goal reiterated to bring the entire system online and repurpose it so it can send humans and cargo to Earth orbit, the Moon, and Mars. to fly increasingly ambitious missions,” SpaceX wrote. Flight 7 mission preview.
Editor’s note: This article was updated on January 15 to reflect the latest launch date from SpaceX.
