WASHINGTON — As SpaceX prepares for its next Starship test flight, the company is also working to increase capacity in Texas to build and launch those vehicles.
On May 20, SpaceX completed a dress rehearsal of the vehicle that will perform its fourth integrated test flight, fueling the vehicle and going through a countdown exercise. That rehearsal was one of the final milestones before SpaceX attempts to launch.
“Starship 4 flight in about 2 weeks,” Elon Musk, CEO of SpaceX, stated on social networks after the test. “The primary goal is to get through the maximum reheat.” The Starship’s upper stage or ship disintegrated during re-entry on a previous test flight on March 14.
SpaceX will also need an updated FAA launch permit. At 39th Space Symposium in April, Kelvin Coleman, the FAA’s associate administrator for commercial space transportation, said completion of the license change was possible in May, but did not confirm it would be ready by the end of the month.
Another SpaceX official recently said he expects the Starship to be ready for launch as soon as the FAA issues an updated license. “We’re still working on licensing with the FAA,” Kathy Lueders, Starbase’s general manager and former NASA associate administrator responsible for human spaceflight programs, said at a May 14 event in Harlingen, Texas, saying “they’re going through several crossings and adding a point at the last minute.”
“We hope to get the license by the end of May, beginning of June,” she said. “The first day we get that permit, we’ll be flying.”
Much of her presentation to the local business group focused on the development of Starbase itself, where SpaceX manufactures Starships and Super Heavy boosters. Lueders said more than 3,000 people, including SpaceX employees and contractors, work daily at the site, which sits at the end of a two-lane highway near where the Rio Grande meets the Gulf of Mexico.
“We have invested billions in this area to prepare facilities,” she said. “It’s not easy to build at the end of Highway 4.” A slide from her presentation noted that SpaceX has invested more than $3 billion in Starbase infrastructure since the facility’s symbolic groundbreaking in 2014 and currently spends $1.1 billion annually on Starbase and its other facilities in Texas. She said an update on the company’s 2021 economic impact report should be ready in the next few weeks.
The priority is the construction of a large production facility, called the “Starfactory”, covering one million square feet and replacing the tents that were used to build the Starship components. “Elon said a year ago, ‘You know what, we have to get rid of these tents and this is now going to be a permanent location,'” she recalled. “So we’re going to build a Starship Giga Factory.” She later said that the company plans to complete that factory by the end of the year.
SpaceX is building an office building to consolidate the engineering workforce at Starbase, she said, along with other senior departments. The company is also building a second orbital launch pad for Starship near the existing pad.
In addition to the Texas infrastructure, SpaceX is working on the Starship launch complex at Kennedy Space Center’s Launch Complex 39A in Florida. The FAA announced May 10 that it is beginning work on an environmental impact statement to address the updated Starship infrastructure there, while a parallel effort by the Air Force Department is examining potential Starship launch facilities at two sites at neighboring Cape Canaveral Space Force Station.
Musk suggested at the 2022 event that Starbase would become an “advanced research and development location” for Starship operations with Florida hosting operational launches, but Lueders said there would be opportunities for both Texas and Florida to support Starship missions.
“We need two launch areas to be able to fulfill our manifest,” she said, specifically for Starship launches for NASA’s Human Landing System program. “One landing will require 15 tanker launches, and they have to be done within a certain period of time.” That estimate of 15 tanker launches is higher than what other company officials have previously said, including an estimate of “about a dozen” launches in January.
“This will be our operating area,” she concluded, “but we’ll also need a base in Florida, so we can do the number and sequence of missions.”
She said she is also working on other aspects of Starbase and its impact on the community, from the quality of life for employees to traffic improvements on the one road leading to the site. “It’s a critical phase for us right now,” she said, as discussions are underway with local and state officials on topics such as the timing of traffic lights on the road to Starbase and encouraging hotel and restaurant development on the east side of Brownsville, the section closest to Starbase. .
These were also discussions about subsequent infrastructure improvements for Starbase, she said, “so that we have a place for long-term business at the end of Highway 4.”