SpaceX's Starship splashes down in Indian Ocean after successful test flight

SpaceX's Starship on Friday sailed through its first test flight since the company went public. "Starship is intact, floating in the ocean and transmitting telemetry!" company head Elon Musk said on X. As the craft flew over a shadowed Earth, a camera fixed to the rocket and streamed live by SpaceX showed thunderstorms with flashes of lightning ​in the background 190 kilometres below. The 122-metre-tall ship splashed into the Indian Ocean to wild cheers from SpaceX employees, who were watching live footage from the company's Starbase. "I'm losing my mind right now," spokesperson Dan Huot said on the livestream. "This is the first time we've put an intact Starship in the water." "This is a dream scenario for the team that's trying to get this heat shield data." The flight aims were similar to those of a mostly successful voyage carried out in May, which debuted the latest edition of the powerful Starship, its third-generation model. The primary goals of this 13th test launch were to once again demonstrate those redesigns in flight – this time without any hiccups. During the mission, the rocket launched 20 of Starlink's V3 satellites, a much more powerful version with greater bandwid...