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As of 2023, SpaceX is developing the Starship system to be a fully-reusable two-stage launch vehicle, intended to replace all of its other launch vehicles and spacecraft for satellite delivery and human transport—Falcon 9, Falcon Heavy, and Dragon—and eventually support flights to the Moon and Mars. It could theoretically be used for point ...
Several companies are currently developing fully reusable launch vehicles as of January 2025. Each of them is working on a two-stage-to-orbit system. SpaceX is testing Starship, which has been in development since 2016 and has made an initial test flight in April 2023 [3] and 5 more flights as of November 2024.
The experiment sought to provide flight data to help Lockheed Martin validate and tune the computational predictive tools used to determine the aerodynamic performance of the Lockheed Martin X-33 lifting body and linear aerospike engine combination and to lay groundwork for a future reusable launch vehicle. [1]
When stacked and fully fueled, Starship has a mass of approximately 5,000 t (11,000,000 lb), [c] a diameter of 9 m (30 ft) [16] and a height of 121.3 m (398 ft). [17] The rocket has been designed with the goal of being fully reusable to reduce launch costs; [18] it consists of the Super Heavy booster and the Starship upper stage [19] which are powered by Raptor and Raptor Vacuum engines.
The third version of the Falcon 9 was developed in 2014–2015 and made its maiden flight in December 2015. The Falcon 9 Full Thrust is a modified reusable variant of the Falcon 9 family with capabilities that exceed the Falcon 9 v1.1, including the ability to "land the first stage for geostationary transfer orbit (GTO) missions on the drone ship" [14] [15] The rocket was designed using ...
Grasshopper was an experimental technology-demonstrator, suborbital reusable launch vehicle (RLV), a vertical takeoff, vertical landing (VTVL) rocket. [34] The first VTVL flight test vehicle—Grasshopper, built on a Falcon 9 v1.0 first-stage tank—made a total of eight test flights between September 2012 and October 2013. [35]
China’s space agency has unveiled an updated design of its first super-heavy reusable rocket which looks eerily similar to SpaceX’s Starship launch vehicle.. New images of the rocket, released ...
2012: SpaceX's Grasshopper rocket was a VTVL first-stage booster test vehicle developed to validate low-altitude, low-velocity engineering aspects of its large-vehicle reusable rocket technology. [20] The test vehicle made eight successful test [21] flights in 2012–2013. Grasshopper v1.0 made its eighth, and final, test flight on October 7 ...