Starship | Flight 13

13th test flight of the two-stage Starship launch vehicle. Second flight of Starship V3. For the first time, Starship will carry 20 V3 Starlink satellites to space, which will extend solar arrays and antennas and will attempt to connect with ground stations in South Africa and the larger Starlink constellation via high-capacity lasers. 6 of the satellites have been modified with a suite of cameras to scan Starship’s heat shield and transmit imagery down to operators to continue testing methods of analyzing Starship’s heat shield readiness for return to launch site on future missions. Several tiles on Starship have been painted white to simulate missing tiles and serve as imaging targets in the test.

Starship | Flight 13 completed its mission. The vehicle performed as expected and the payload reached its intended destination. SpaceX logged another successful flight in what has become a routine that was, not long ago, considered impossible to achieve at this pace.

The launch vehicle successfully inserted its payload(s) into the target orbit(s).

Third development version of the Starship reusable two-stage super heavy-lift launch vehicle.