LIVESTREAM: Starship Flight 9

Starship Flight Test 9 will be the 9th flight of SpaceX's Starship fully assembled megarocket. The current launch date is set for May 27, 2025. Ship 35 (S35) and Booster 14 (B14) will be used for this mission. This launch comes after two failed launches this year, Flight 7 and Flight 8, in January and March, respectively. On those flights, SpaceX successfully returned its Super Heavy booster to Earth in back-to-back rocket catches at with giant chopsticks, but the Ship stage of the rocket failed shortly after liftoff. The Super Heavy booster used for this mission, tail number B14, will be the first to fly for a second time, reusing 29 out of the original 33 engines flown during Starship Flight 7. The booster will target a hard splashdown in the Gulf of Mexico more than 6.5 minutes after liftoff. That's because it is the first time SpaceX is attempting to refly such a huge rocket. The Starship upper stage, tail number S35, aims to perform similar flight objectives laid out during the Flight 7 and Flight 8 missions, like deploying Starlink simulators along a suborbital trajectory and an in-space Raptor engine relight demo. Designed to eventually be fully reusable, Starship stands 120 meters (397 feet) tall with both stages combined, 27 meters (90 feet) taller than the American Statue of Liberty. Its Super Heavy booster produces 16.7 million pounds (74.3 meganewtons) of thrust, almost double that of the world's second most powerful rocket, NASA's Space Launch System.