Elon Musk reveals that the Starship is ready for launch, pending FAA approval

“Starship is ready for launch. Awaiting regulatory approval”. Those were the words that put an end to the wait: Elon Musk, the CEO of SpaceX, revealed that the long-awaited ship is ready to take off.

Starship is the future fully reusable spacecraft and launch system developed by SpaceX as a private spaceflight project. As has been said before, it is being designed to allow the transport of cargo and passengers towards Earth orbit, the Moon, Mars and beyond.

According to Musk’s company, could perform Starship’s first orbital flight test as soon as this week. Last Thursday, the private space company tweeted new photos of the super-heavy-lift rocket at its Boca Chica facility in Texas.

“Fully stacked Starship on Starbase. The team is working towards a launch test next week, followed by Starship’s first integrated flight test a week later, pending regulatory approval.”, reads the tweet.

The expected release date of Starship

As he recalls a report from Engadget, the date of Starship’s first orbital flight has been a moving target for nearly two years. In early February, a week after SpaceX successfully carried out the rocket’s first stacked fueling test, Elon Musk said the company would try to launch Starship in March if the remaining tests went well.

Days later, SpaceX attempted to statically fire all 33 of the vehicle’s Raptor first-stage engines, something it hadn’t attempted to do before. The test was a critical step toward Starship’s first orbital flight, though the rocket didn’t exactly pass the test, as two engines failed before the end of firing.

Still, the timeline Musk shared this week may be too optimistic. In fact, this Monday, April 10, he tweeted: “Starship launch trending towards the end of the third week of April”.

According to Space.com, the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has set a tentative launch window of April 17 for Starship. However, the outlet reports that the FAA has yet to grant SpaceX a launch license for the rocketsomething you’ll need to do before the ship can legally fly.