SpaceX, the Elon Musk-led spaceflight company, currently launches its Starship rocket from Starbase in Texas. However, it also plans to launch Starship from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. For this to happen, SpaceX’s plans must be approved by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) through an environmental review.
The FAA announced on Friday that it will conduct the review, as SpaceX has made changes to its plans for the Starship and its associated infrastructure since NASA’s previous assessment five years ago. The changes include an increased launch frequency from 24 per year to as many as 44, and a slightly more powerful rocket design. SpaceX also wants to land the first-stage booster at Launch Complex 39A instead of at Landing Zone 1.
The Starship’s colossal thrust of 17 million pounds at launch is more than double that of the Saturn V rocket that powered the Apollo astronauts to the moon from the same launch facility five decades ago. It’s also almost twice that of NASA’s next-generation Space Launch System (SLS) rocket, which launched for the first time in November 2022. This increased thrust has the potential to disrupt the local environment more than any other vehicle launched from Florida’s Space Coast.
The maiden launch of the Starship, which has only flown three times to date, completely destroyed the Starbase launch pad when the force of the engines proved too great as the rocket lifted off. Debris was spread far and wide, including into protected wildlife areas, causing concern among environmentalists. SpaceX has since built a more robust pad capable of handling subsequent launches.
Residents along the Space Coast are accustomed to seeing launches involving SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket, which has a launch thrust of 1.7 million pounds, and the occasional mission by the more powerful Falcon Heavy. However, Starship launches will be on a completely different scale.
