8th Starship Launch Scrubbed

SpaceX on Monday delayed its eighth Starship test flight—the second one this year, and the first of President Trump's administration. SpaceX aimed for a 6:45pm Eastern launch time, but the launch was scrubbed after the countdown was held at 40 seconds due to last-minute issues, Space.com reports. The Starship team is "determining the next best available opportunity to fly," SpaceX said in a post on X. In an earlier post on X, the company said the flight test "will target objectives not reached on the previous test, including Starship's first payload deployment and multiple reentry experiments geared towards returning the upper stage to the launch site for catch."

The company also plans to return the lower stage, the Super Heavy booster, to be caught in the giant robotic arms, or "chopsticks," of a structure nicknamed "Mechazilla," CNN reports. After the previous launch, on Jan. 17, Starship exploded over the Caribbean Sea, causing air traffic chaos and scattering debris over the Turks and Caicos Islands. The New York Times describes the eight launch, which could happen as soon as Tuesday, as "largely a do-over" of the seventh test flight. SpaceX says it has made changes including altering feed lines carrying propellant to the engines to prevent the oscillations believed to have caused fires, triggering the spacecraft's self-destruct system. This story has been updated with new developments. (More Starship stories.)