SpaceX’s Starship V3 deploys most advanced Starlink satellites then pulls off best re-entry yet with splashdown so soft it floated in the Indian Ocean

SpaceX’s mammoth Starship rocket blasted off Friday on another test flight stretching halfway around the world, this time releasing 20 of the most advanced Starlinks.Recommended Video Towering 407 feet (124 meters), Starship soared from the company’s base at the southern tip of Texas. NASA monitored the space-skimming flight, a critical step toward using the Starship as a lunar lander for moon crews. The hourlong journey ended with a splashdown so soft that the spacecraft remained afloat in the Indian Ocean as the SpaceX webcast drew to a close, drawing cheers from employees back at the launch site. Elon Musk’s SpaceX had replaced six of the 33 engines on the first-stage booster after some of them failed to ignite last week, resulting in a last-second launch abort.

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