SpaceX completes stacking biggest rocket ever built

News, US August 7, 2021 , by IRIA No Comments

SpaceX completes stacking Starship for first orbital flight

The American company SpaceX has attached its Starship spacecraft to its booster, making it the biggest spacecraft ever built.

Elon Musk is hoping to use Starship to send people to the Moon and beyond, in line with the billionaire’s plans to allow humanity to become a multiplanetary species. Musk said it was a “dream come true” moment.

Starship Fully Stacked pic.twitter.com/Fs88RNsmfH

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) August 6, 2021

The upper-stage called Starship and a booster called Super Heavy were connected together at the firm’s Starbase R&D facility in Boca Chica, Texas.

Starship SN20 (“Serial No. 20”) and its Super Heavy booster together stood a whopping 395 feet tall (120 m), taller than NASA’s massive Saturn V moon rocket, which was 363 feet tall (110 m).

SpaceX CEO Elon Musk said there were four “significant items” SpaceX would need to complete before its Starship orbital launch. These include final heat shield tiles for Starship, thermal protection for the Super Heavy’s engines, more ground system propellant storage tanks and a quick disconnect arm for Starship.

There are attached 29 Raptor rocket engines to the rocket — making it one of the biggest rocket boosters in history.

A photo shared by Elon Musk today shows the sheer scale of the operation. “Completing feed system for 29 Raptor rocket engines on Super Heavy Booster,” Musk wrote.