" EXPLODED" — Everything You Need to Know About SpaceX Starship Flight 12!

Added: 2026-05-24

[00:00:00]This is a view from from one of those satellites as we deployed it. Looks like this was from the last one out. Flashlight turning on, taking a look at Starship in space.

[00:00:14]The way this system is set up is the satellites are essentially recording it and making contact with our Starlink constellation and then transferring that video back down to us on the ground.

[00:00:26]After almost half a year, Starship finally roared back to life again. This time we got it all, an even more humongous rocket, crowds cheering, massive explosions, and views from space that we've never seen before on any other flight. Here is everything that happened during Starship flight 12. The good news was that the countdown had been surprisingly smooth. There were no issues with the weather, the pad, or the vehicle itself, and everything was still green for launch.

[00:00:54]As the final minutes ticked away, teams were wrapping up propellant loading on Starship while Super Heavy was set to finish just seconds later.

[00:01:02]By that point, the full stack was holding more than 11.5 million pounds of liquid propellant.

[00:01:09]Once fueling was complete, crews began clearing the lines running from the tank farm to the launch mount and preparing the pad for liftoff. Once the clock passed T minus 40 seconds, events started happening very quickly.

[00:01:21]>> [snorts] >> The quick disconnect vent gate retracted away from the vehicle, disconnecting the pad systems from Starship and the booster.

[00:01:29]Both stages switched their communication systems into flight mode while automated leak checks ran across the tanks and plumbing.

[00:01:36]Super Heavy transitioned to internal power. Its engines went through final priming and Starship's engines began their ascent bleed sequence while the flight termination system armed itself for launch. The flame diverter on pad two activated around T minus 17 seconds, and by T minus 10 seconds, the vehicle was effectively at the point of no return.

[00:01:57]Right before launch, the commentator stopped talking to let everyone hear the sounds of the pad and the first flight of Starship version 3.

[00:02:05]9 8 7 6 5 4 3 ignition We have liftoff.

[00:02:23]At ignition, all 33 Raptor 3 engines on booster V3 roared to life. The giant rocket climbed away from the pad and headed out over the Gulf.

[00:02:32]About 30 seconds into flight, all 33 engines were confirmed healthy as Starship powered toward maximum aerodynamic pressure or max Q.

[00:02:42]Telemetry and avionics remained nominal while the vehicle pushed through the most stressful part of ascent. A little over a minute into flight, the next major event approached hot staging.

[00:02:52]SpaceX's version of main engine cut-off involved shutting down all but five booster engines before igniting Starship's six engines while the two stages were still attached.

[00:03:02]During this process, clamps inside the hot stage ring would retract and protect themselves as the stages separated.

[00:03:09]During ascent, one of the booster's engines appeared to shut down early, leaving the booster flying on 32 Raptors.

[00:03:16]Even so, the hot staging sequence continued.

[00:03:20]In version 3, the ignition sequence had been slightly changed. The three vacuum Raptors ignited first, followed almost immediately by one center sea level engine to give the booster a controlled push in a known direction before the remaining engines lit. Starship lit all six engines successfully, but things were not completely perfect. The booster did not appear to ignite as many engines as expected for its boost back burn, and shortly after the boost back sequence ended early. Since this mission was only planned for a Gulf splashdown rather than a tower catch, the booster simply continued descending toward the water.

[00:03:56]Meanwhile, Starship pressed on.

[00:03:59]The ship just finished its engine burn, although one of the vacuum raptors shut down, leaving the ship flying on five engines instead of six.

[00:04:06]Thankfully, Starship was designed with engine out capability, so the mission could continue normally.

[00:04:12]With the booster visible on one side of the screen and the ship on the other, the vehicle kept accelerating along its planned suborbital trajectory. By around T plus 3 minutes and 50 seconds, Starship was still burning steadily. The planned descent burn had been expected to last a little over 8 minutes, though engineers noted it might run slightly longer because of the missing engine.

[00:04:33]Down below, the booster continued falling back toward the Gulf, eventually splashing down after what appeared to be an incomplete landing sequence. As the mission passed T plus 5 minutes, Starship continued flying smoothly on five healthy engines.

[00:04:47]The team confirmed good chamber pressures despite the missing Raptor vacuum engine.

[00:04:53]Cameras provided incredible live views of Earth in the background transmitted through Starlink, while upgraded onboard cameras gave detailed shots inside the engine section as the three center engines and remaining vacuum engines continued firing. Near the end of the ascent burn, teams estimated only about 20 seconds remained before SECO, or second engine cut off.

[00:05:14]Because of the engine out situation, the burn was intentionally extended slightly longer to compensate.

[00:05:19]At around T plus 9 minutes, the shutdown finally began.

[00:05:23]The vacuum raptors powered down, followed by the sea level engines completing Starship's ascent burn after flying almost the entire climb with only five of its six engines. Today's mission was about much more than simply reaching space. Starship's objectives included deploying 20 Starlink simulator satellites, along with two experimental satellites internally nicknamed Dodger Dogs.

[00:05:46]These newer satellites were designed to test hardware planned for future Starlink V3 missions.

[00:05:52]Then mission control received an important update. Because of the engine out situation during ascent, the team announced they would likely skip the planned in-space Raptor relight.

[00:06:02]The relight test was planned to be a little different this time around.

[00:06:06]Instead of a quick ignition, the team wanted to attempt a longer duration relight to gather more data.

[00:06:12]It's a bit of a shame that it did not happen. However, Starship was still on a safe trajectory and payload deployment remained on schedule. By around 17 minutes into the flight, the timeline reached one of the mission's biggest milestones. Payload deployment.

[00:06:27]Inside the payload bay, cameras showed the PEZ dispenser door opening. As I said earlier, today's payload stack included 22 deployables in total.

[00:06:37]20 were mass simulators, roughly matching the size and weight of future Starlink V3 satellites. While the final two Dodger Dogs were modified Starlink satellites carrying experimental V3 hardware solar arrays, cameras, and lighting systems. Those last two satellites had a particularly interesting role. SpaceX wanted them to fly away from Starship and look back at the vehicle using onboard cameras and powerful lights. The goal was to inspect parts of Starship's heat shield that onboard cameras could not normally see, especially sections along the underbelly.

[00:07:13]As deployment began, the upgraded version 3 PEZ dispenser quickly pushed the satellites out into space one after another. The faster deployment system was an important upgrade because future Starship missions could eventually carry around 60 Starlink satellites at once.

[00:07:30]One by one, the simulators drifted into orbit. Internal payload bay cameras showed the top of the propellant tank beneath the stack, while external cameras captured satellites sliding out through the open dispenser door into space. One of the coolest moments of the mission came shortly after payload deployment. Using footage transmitted through the Starlink network, SpaceX was finally able to get a live look back at Starship from one of the free-flying satellites it had just released into orbit. The view showed the satellite drifting away from the ship as its bright onboard flashlight switched on, illuminating Starship against the darkness of space.

[00:08:08]The way the system worked was surprisingly clever.

[00:08:11]The small satellite recorded video locally, then connected to the Starlink constellation to relay the footage back down to Earth.

[00:08:19]And there it was, Starship flying through space seen from another spacecraft for the very first time. As cool as the footage looked, it also served a very important purpose.

[00:08:31]SpaceX had been trying for a long time to develop a free-flyer system that could deploy from Starship's payload bay, maneuver nearby, and inspect the vehicle from the outside.

[00:08:42]The ultimate goal was to closely examine the heat shield while Starship was still in orbit, something that becomes extremely important once the company begins attempting full catches and rapid reuse of the ship in the future. As the mission approached the 40-minute mark, attention shifted toward the next major phase, re-entry.

[00:09:00]The planned in-space Raptor re-light had officially been skipped since it was not necessary for the ship's trajectory.

[00:09:07]Starship was already on the correct suborbital path toward its targeted splashdown zone in the Indian Ocean.

[00:09:14]However, SpaceX still planned to attempt a landing burn later in the flight using the remaining healthy sea-level Raptors.

[00:09:21]Even though this is the first flight of this version, the team was not taking it easy on the vehicle during re-entry.

[00:09:27]Instead, they intentionally planned to stress Starship as much as possible.

[00:09:32]One of the major tests involved pitching the the upward and fully deploying the aft flaps to place enormous aerodynamic loads on them during hypersonic flight.

[00:09:43]Another maneuver later in descent would simulate the banking turn Starship will eventually perform when returning directly to the launch site for a tower catch. As Starship began descending into Earth's atmosphere, plasma slowly started forming around the vehicle.

[00:09:58]Bright oranges and pinks spread across the screen as the heat built up outside the ship. Reentry is one of the hardest parts of any space mission. During launch, Starship had used roughly 18 million pounds of thrust or more than 8,000 metric tons of force to accelerate into space.

[00:10:16]Now, all of that energy had to be removed again through aerodynamic braking as the ship slammed back into the atmosphere at hypersonic speed. At the start of reentry, Starship was still traveling around 23,500 km/h, roughly Mach 19 or about 6.5 km/s.

[00:10:35]At those speeds, the atmosphere itself turns into plasma around the vehicle, often causing communication blackouts.

[00:10:42]Despite that, Starlink continued providing surprisingly stable live video and telemetry throughout much of the descent. The plasma may have looked beautiful on camera, but the conditions around the spacecraft were incredibly violent. Temperatures on the heat shield can climb beyond 1,500° C while the ship endures massive aerodynamic forces. Making it through those phases successfully meant the ship had survived the harshest parts of atmospheric entry.

[00:11:09]Meanwhile, cameras mounted on the flaps showed the control surfaces actively moving as Starship guided itself through the atmosphere. One particularly important test involved the forward flaps.

[00:11:19]Since the in-space engine relight had been canceled, extra propellant remained inside the header tanks near the nose of the ship.

[00:11:27]That additional mass created even higher loads on the forward flaps during descent, making this an especially aggressive structural test. Starship transitioned into the next maneuver, the simulated return to launch site banking turn.

[00:11:41]This banking maneuver is critical for future Starship catches at Starbase.

[00:11:45]Instead of descending straight down, the ship performs a huge sweeping turn to line itself up with the launch tower.

[00:11:52]Even though today's flight would end in the Indian Ocean, SpaceX still wanted to practice the exact same guidance profile. The spacecraft was now only minutes away from splashdown.

[00:12:03]Mission control announced that the ship was officially on target. Starship rotated into position for landing as the team prepared for the final engine burn.

[00:12:13]Normally, three sea level Raptors would ignite for landing, but today SpaceX planned to attempt it using only two engines.

[00:12:21]Landing burn startup.

[00:12:23]Landing burn startup.

[00:12:27]Two engines lit.

[00:12:33]Six seconds on the clock.

[00:12:35]Starship rotated upright in one smooth motion as fire erupted around the vehicle.

[00:12:41]Strangely enough, that huge fireball was exactly what the team had hoped to see.

[00:12:46]It meant the landing sequence had worked as planned.

[00:12:49]After traveling over 15,000 km from Texas to the Indian Ocean in less than an hour, Starship completed its targeted splashdown.

[00:12:58]You know, at the beginning of the show >> [cheering] >> We're pretty hyped.