Update (1909ET):
Seconds before launch, SpaceX halted the countdown at T-40 seconds as flight controllers addressed an undisclosed issue.
"T-40 seconds and holding. Teams are using this time for final checks," SpaceX wrote on X.
Minutes later, SpaceX announced that Test Flight 8 would be scrapped due to an undisclosed issue with the Super Heavy booster.
"Standing down from today's flight test attempt. Starship team is determining the next best available opportunity to fly," the rocket company wrote on X.
SpaceX's Dan Huot said millions of pounds of propellant from the Starship spacecraft and Super Heavy booster would be offloaded. He did not provide a future date for the next launch.
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Just over six weeks after SpaceX's Starship-Super Heavy Flight Test 7 lifted off from Boca Chica, Texas, ending in a dramatic spectacle—the massive booster successfully caught by 'Chopsticks' while Starship itself was lost in a fireball over the Atlantic Ocean—Elon Musk's space company is set to conduct Flight Test 8 of the world's largest rocket this evening.
Starship's launch window opens at 1730 local time at SpaceX's Starbase facility in south Texas. The primary goal of this launch is to test Starship's ability to deploy Starlink "simulator" satellites into low Earth orbit.
Summary of Flight Test 8:
The crypto-based online betting marketplace Polymarket has nine bets on today's test flight, including the following: Will "Chopsticks catch Super Heavy?" Those odds stand at 78%.
Watch Test Flight 8 Here:
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