SpaceX rolled Ship 41 to the launch web site for stacking with Booster 21, and the warmth defend on that ship features a first for the Starship program: two tiles recovered from Ship 40 after Flight 13.
These tiles sit on the aft finish of Ship 41, close to the aft flaps. They got here off a automobile that spent 24 days within the Indian Ocean after splashdown and later returned to Starbase on the heavy-lift vessel Forte.
A Starship warmth defend makes use of about 20,000 tiles, so reusing two of them is barely a small pattern. Even so, it’s the first time flown Starship tile {hardware} has been assigned to fly once more.
Booster 21 was already ready on Pad 2, and stacking Ship 41 onto it should full the Flight 14 automobile. SpaceX is focusing on the mission no sooner than September 28, pending regulatory approval.
If the flight proceeds as deliberate, it will likely be Starship’s first try at orbit, with a multi-hour coast and a deliberate deployment of operational Starlink V3 satellites earlier than a Pacific splashdown.
The following main program aim named in SpaceX’s newest documentary episode is returning a ship to the launch web site, a touchdown that will place extra demand on the warmth defend than an ocean splashdown.
The 2 tiles now heading to the pad are the seen hyperlink between that subsequent stack and Flight 13.
Ship 41 has two tiles taken from Starboat Ship 40. A really helpful refly of the TPS. pic.twitter.com/whyAHVcr3x
— NSF – NASASpaceflight.com (@NASASpaceflight) September 23, 2026
SpaceX launched the third episode in its Starship documentary sequence on September 16 and posted the identical 28-minute movie to YouTube on September 18.
“The Holy Grail of Rocketry” facilities on Ship 40, the Flight 13 higher stage that survived splashdown within the Indian Ocean, remained intact for weeks, and later yielded heatshield {hardware} for Ship 41.
Flight 13 launched from Starbase on July 24. Ship 40 accomplished the softest splashdown of the Starship check marketing campaign, then tipped onto its aspect and stayed intact. Restoration of the ship was not the mission’s major goal.
SpaceX had studied an Indian Ocean restoration earlier than and eliminated that aim from the earlier two V3 flights after earlier ships broke up on water impression.
Management room audio within the movie data the touchdown name and the primary response to an intact automobile. “We obtained a complete rocket. We obtained the entire thing.” One other caller says the ship seems prone to final lengthy sufficient for a restoration try, and SpaceX then moved to get better S40.
Mauro Prina, SpaceX senior director of Starship engineering, mentioned he didn’t anticipate the rocket to outlive tipover. The intact automobile, he mentioned, left SpaceX “sitting on a mine of gold of information” within the Indian Ocean and would enable design modifications no less than three months sooner than he had anticipated.
One speaker within the movie calls the floating automobile “absolutely the gold of the info” and says the staff doesn’t understand how lengthy it should stay intact. After descoping restoration on current V3 flights, SpaceX put the trouble again on the schedule as soon as S40 survived.
Restoration crews reached S40 about 500 to 600 nautical miles off Western Australia and made the primary hookup to a Starship within the water.
Crew members mentioned the automobile had little draft, a few foot and a half to 2 ft, and a big sail space that made it arduous to manage. “It fought us all the means,” one crew member mentioned. “The rocket didn’t need to get recovered.”
Sixteen- to 18-foot seas and 40- to 45-knot winds slowed the tow. Justin Styer, senior director of Starship launch, mentioned the restoration was off plan after a few weeks.
The tow was extraordinarily gradual, and even that velocity started to wreck the automobile. SpaceX first deliberate a tow towards mainland Australia, then deserted that route. On August 7, Elon Musk mentioned the restoration was “not wanting good,” whereas noting that crews had obtained close-up images of crucial heat-shield and engine areas for later upgrades.
Crews later secured the ship off Christmas Island, an Australian territory within the Indian Ocean, about 24 days after splashdown. SpaceX then used Forte to hold S40 again to Starbase. Within the movie, crews float the ship onto Forte’s deck, set it on a cradle, and deballast the vessel so S40 will be tied down.
An engineer on the barge mentioned the flight was simply over a month previous and the rocket had been dry on deck for 2 days. “I feel when it comes to the info we’ve been capable of get again, this mission has been an absolute success.”
After groups confirmed S40 was secure and secure to strategy, SpaceX eliminated two thermal safety tiles for reuse on Ship 41. An engineer within the movie mentioned a single tile represents virtually half a decade of growth and that putting in 20,000 tiles creates 20,000 probabilities to get the attachment fallacious.
Flight 13 footage reveals Ship 40 in peak heating. A caller says the automobile is coming into at about 25 occasions the velocity of sound and that the vitality turns into warmth. The ship then flies the “swoosh” maneuver used to observe a return towards a tower earlier than the touchdown burn and splashdown.
Prina and different engineers within the episode mentioned tiles additionally face masses on ascent. Airflow throughout launch can get below tiles and pull them off, and plasma can do the identical throughout reentry. A lacking tile leaves that space protected by ablative materials, which isn’t absolutely reusable. The movie compares that failure mode to tile loss on the House Shuttle throughout ascent.
Current flights recognized the areas almost certainly to lose tiles. SpaceX is utilizing curved tiles to alter airflow and plasma paths, scale back heating in tile gaps, and restrict tiles coming free, and it’s also utilizing totally different retention {hardware} in these areas. Engineers within the movie mentioned discoveries from S40 are being utilized to the warmth defend on S41.
Flight 13 additionally broken Tremendous Heavy. Throughout the last section of Booster 20’s boostback towards the Gulf of Mexico, the three heart Raptor engines confirmed indicators of ice clogging.
B20 ended the burn early and ignited eight of 13 engines on the touchdown try, however the booster didn’t gradual sufficient for a comfortable splashdown. Later boosters obtained ice-filter mounts and software program modifications geared toward relight reliability.
SpaceX mentioned within the movie that S40 would have been caught if a tower had been on the touchdown web site on Flight 13. The 2 tiles faraway from S40 are those now using Ship 41 to the pad.
The episode additionally recaps earlier SpaceX reuse work, together with Grasshopper hop assessments and the primary Falcon 9 pad touchdown at Cape Canaveral. S40 didn’t full a tower touchdown, nevertheless it left SpaceX with a recovered warmth defend, inspection images, and {hardware} assigned to the following ship.
Featured Picture: Credit score: Jerry Pike for NSF.
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