What NASA Wants and Expects from Starship Testing

Eric Berger at Ars Technica speculates that few people if any were happier with Starship's flight test IFT-4 last week than a NASA engineer named Catherine Koerner. 

In remarks after the spaceflight, Koerner praised the "incredible" video of the Starship rocket and its Super Heavy booster returning to Earth, with each making a soft landing. "That was very promising, and a very, very successful engineering test," she added, speaking at a meeting of the Space Studies Board.

A former flight director, Koerner now manages development of the "exploration systems" that will support the Artemis missions for NASA—a hugely influential position within the space agency. This includes the Space Launch System rocket, NASA's Orion spacecraft, spacesuits, and the Starship vehicle that will land on the Moon.

That's a lot to be overseeing, and it's not all going spectacularly smoothly. There are many reasons to be concerned with the announced date of September 2026 for the Artemis III mission that will land on the moon. While IFT-4 demonstrated a lot of progress there is still much to do to ensure a successful moon landing. Much of that has little or nothing to do with SpaceX and Starship.

Depending on where they work and how high up the "org tree" they are, engineers can spend as much - or more - time contingency planning as they do designing. As part of trying to make those plans, NASA and SpaceX have raised the the possibility of modifying the Artemis III mission. Instead of landing on the Moon, a crew would launch in the Orion spacecraft and rendezvous with Starship in low-Earth orbit. This would essentially be a repeat of the Apollo 9 mission, buying down risk by carrying out some of the essential parts of the Artemis III mission, making fewer "first time we ever try this" aspects for the landing mission.

Officially, NASA maintains that the agency will fly a crewed lunar landing, the Artemis III mission, in September 2026. But almost no one in the space community regards that launch date as more than aspirational. Some of my best sources have put the most likely range of dates for such a mission from 2028 to 2032. A modified Artemis III mission, in low-Earth orbit, would therefore bridge a gap between Artemis II and an eventual landing.

NASA hasn't announced any final plans and there is much to wait on. What's the status on Orion's heat shield issues? Part of the waiting is to see how Artemis II progresses and what happens with Starship and spacesuit development. 

During her remarks, Koerner was also asked what SpaceX's next major milestone is and when it would need to be completed for NASA to remain on track for a lunar landing in 2026. "Their next big milestone test, from a contract perspective, is the cryogenic transfer test," she said. "That is going to be early next year."

Some details about the Starship propellant transfer test. Image credit: NASA

This timeline is consistent with what NASA's Human Landing System program manager, Lisa Watson-Morgan recently told Ars. It provides a useful benchmark to evaluate Starship's progress in NASA's eyes. The "prop transfer demo" is a fairly complex mission that involves the launch of a "Starship target" from the Starbase facility in South Texas. Then a second vehicle, the "Starship chaser," will launch and meet the target in orbit and rendezvous. The chaser will then transfer a quantity of propellant to the target spaceship.

The test will entail a lot of technology, including docking mechanisms, navigation sensors, quick disconnects, and more. If SpaceX completes this test during the first quarter of 2025, NASA will at least theoretically have a path forward to a crewed lunar landing in 2026.

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There has been a flurry of reports the next test flight will be in July, but I haven't seen a date mentioned. July 6th would a month after the last test flight and that's three weeks before the end of the month so it doesn't take much delay to make it two months after IFT-4. Since the booster landed on target 12 miles off the Boca Chica beach, the booster for IFT-5 will be expected to work better than that, and yes, it sounds like they intend to catch the booster with the mechazilla arms. Booster 12 has been in Mega Bay 1 since January, and is awaiting static fire.  

Don't forget that one engine on the booster failed before it cleared the tower and another blew up  during its landing burn before settling onto the Gulf waters. That's being looked into, too.

The ship is a different matter. While Ship 29 was nothing short of astonishing, surviving part of a flap being burned off, it landed "several km" from its target. Ship 30 has to address those issues starting with, "let's not melt this time."

Because of these issues, Ship 30 is already getting its heat shield tiles and underlying blankets removed and eventually replaced. The underlying blankets would be replaced by a new ablative material that may have debuted on Ship 29. As stated by Elon Musk, the tiles are getting upgraded to a newer, much stronger design. Even though Ship 29 completed the flip and burn maneuver, it was a couple of kilometers off target due to the flap damage. 

Starship 29 and Super Heavy B11 before last Thursday's (June 6) IFT-4. Image credit to Elon Musk at X.