Level 1 — Absolute Beginner
SpaceX is an American company. It builds big rockets. Its biggest rocket is called Starship.
There is a new Starship called Version 3, or V3 for short. It is the third design of this rocket. It is bigger and stronger than the older one.
SpaceX will launch Starship V3 on May 19. The rocket will fly from Texas, in the south of the United States.
The rocket will not land back on the ground this time. The bottom part, called Super Heavy, will land softly in the sea instead.
- rocket
- a long machine that flies into space
- company
- a business that sells things or services
- launch
- to send a rocket into the sky
- Texas
- a large state in the south of the U.S.
- version
- one form or design of something
- design
- the plan or shape of something
- sea
- a large body of salt water
- land
- to come down safely from the air
Level 2 — Elementary
SpaceX has confirmed that it will try to launch the new third version of its Starship rocket on Tuesday, May 19. The 90-minute launch window opens at 6:30 p.m. Eastern Time. It will be Starship's twelfth test flight overall.
Starship is the largest and most powerful rocket ever built. Together with its Super Heavy first stage, it stands about 121 meters tall. SpaceX says future versions will one day carry people to the Moon and Mars.
Version 3, or V3, brings stronger Raptor engines, a stronger steel structure, and a slightly larger fuel tank. The first stage engines now produce about 250 tonnes of thrust each, up from 230 tonnes on the older design.
This flight will be the first ever to use Pad 2, a brand-new launch site at the Starbase facility in South Texas. Twenty-two dummy Starlink satellites will fly on board to test the rocket's payload door. Two of them have cameras and will take pictures of the heat shield to help SpaceX prepare to bring a real Starship back home in the future.
- launch window
- the time period during which a rocket can take off
- first stage
- the bottom part of a rocket, which gives the first push
- thrust
- the pushing force a rocket engine makes
- fuel tank
- a container that holds the rocket's fuel
- facility
- a place built for a special purpose, like rocket tests
- dummy
- a copy used for practice, not a real one
- payload
- the cargo a rocket carries into space
- heat shield
- a covering that protects a spacecraft from extreme heat
Level 3 — Intermediate
SpaceX confirmed on May 14 that it is targeting no earlier than Tuesday, May 19, for the debut of Starship Version 3 — collectively the third major iteration of its Starship-Super Heavy stack. Liftoff is scheduled inside a 90-minute window that opens at 6:30 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time from the company's Starbase site at Boca Chica, in South Texas. Designated Flight 12, the mission will also mark the first use of Pad 2, the newly built launch and catch infrastructure adjacent to the original orbital launch mount.
Starship V3 is a substantial upgrade. The Super Heavy booster's Raptor 3 engines now produce roughly 250 tf of sea-level thrust each, up from 230 tf on V2, while their vacuum-optimized cousins on the ship climb from 258 tf to 275 tf. A reinforced stainless-steel structure, larger propellant volumes and refined thermal protection are intended to support full reusability in operational service.
Twenty-two simulator Starlink satellites will ride along — roughly double the count of recent flights. The last two satellites are equipped with onboard cameras designed to scan Starship's stainless-steel and ceramic heat shield as the vehicle re-enters the atmosphere, beaming the imagery back to SpaceX engineers in near-real time. That data is expected to inform shield-readiness checks for an eventual return-to-launch-site catch.
Unlike recent flights, the Super Heavy booster will not return to Starbase. Instead, it will simulate a precision touchdown over the Gulf of Mexico before performing a soft splashdown, allowing engineers to validate the new pad infrastructure without complicating it with a live booster recovery. The Starship upper stage is expected to perform a near-orbital trajectory and a controlled descent of its own to validate the V3 thermal protection system.
- iteration
- one repeated version of an evolving design
- liftoff
- the moment a rocket leaves the launch pad
- Eastern Daylight Time
- the U.S. East Coast time during daylight saving
- Raptor 3
- the latest version of SpaceX's main methane-oxygen engine
- vacuum-optimized
- designed to perform best in the near-vacuum of space
- propellant
- the fuel and oxidizer that power a rocket
- reusability
- the ability to fly the same rocket more than once
- near-real time
- with almost no delay from when something happens to when it is shown
Level 4 — Advanced
SpaceX confirmed on May 14 that it is targeting no earlier than Tuesday, May 19, for the inaugural launch of Starship Version 3, the third major iteration of its fully reusable Starship-Super Heavy architecture. Designated Flight 12, the mission is scheduled to lift off within a 90-minute window opening at 6:30 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time from the company's Starbase site at Boca Chica, Texas, and will also mark the first use of Pad 2, the newly commissioned launch-and-catch complex adjacent to the original orbital launch mount.
V3 introduces meaningful performance upgrades over the V2 architecture that has flown to date. Raptor 3 sea-level engines on the Super Heavy first stage are now rated at roughly 250 tf of thrust apiece, up from 230 tf on V2, while their vacuum-optimized variants installed on the ship climb from 258 tf to 275 tf. A reinforced stainless-steel airframe, expanded propellant volumes, refined heat-shield tile geometry and a redesigned forward flap arrangement are collectively intended to support an operational duty cycle of routine same-pad reuse.
The flight will carry 22 mass-simulator Starlink satellites — roughly double recent loadings — to validate the upgraded payload door and pez-style deployment mechanism. The final two simulators are outfitted with onboard cameras whose mission is to image Starship's stainless-and-ceramic windward surface during high-Mach atmospheric reentry, downlinking the imagery in near-real time to inform engineers' assessment of thermal-protection-system readiness for an eventual return-to-launch-site catch.
Unlike Flights 6, 7 and 11, the Super Heavy booster on this mission will not attempt a tower-arm recovery. Instead, after boostback and propulsive deceleration, it will execute a precision overshoot followed by a soft splashdown in the Gulf of Mexico — a deliberate decision to validate Pad 2 launch hardware in isolation before adding the operational complexity of a live recovery. The Starship upper stage is expected to fly a near-orbital ballistic profile with a controlled, fully instrumented descent that exercises the V3 thermal protection system from peak heating through transonic flap authority.
- inaugural
- marking the first instance of something
- fully reusable
- designed for every part to be flown again
- duty cycle
- how often and how heavily a system is used
- windward surface
- the side facing into the airflow during reentry
- downlink
- to send data from a spacecraft to the ground
- boostback
- a maneuver that reverses a booster's direction after stage separation
- ballistic profile
- the unpowered curve a body follows under gravity
- transonic
- near the speed of sound
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