SpaceX aborts Starship Flight 13 launch from Texas after ignition
SpaceX had to abort its Starship Flight 13 launch just moments after the engines fired up on Thursday evening.
The rocket was set to lift off from Texas at 6:45pm but everything stopped suddenly, and the cause is still being checked out.
As SpaceX spokesperson Dan Huot put it, "We'll take some time, dig into what triggered that abort once the booster was igniting to launch, and then we'll figure out what our path forward is going to be."
Planned upgrade test and Starlink deployment
Flight 13 was planned as a big test for the latest Starship upgrades after issues with May's flight.
It also aimed to land both rocket stages safely and send up 20 brand-new Starlink V3 satellites: six of these have cameras on board to capture heat shield footage and gather data for future missions.
Even though things didn't go as planned this time, SpaceX says they're focused on learning and moving forward.