SpaceX launches Starship on giant rocket’s first flight to orbit

Updated on: September 28, 2026 / 9:05 AM EDT / CBS News

SpaceX launched the company's Super Heavy-Starship on its first flight to orbit Monday, a major step toward perfecting the world's most powerful rocket for commercial flights and NASA moon missions.

With 13 suborbital test flights behind them, this flight marks a crucial step for both SpaceX and NASA. Getting the Starship into orbit and back will boost confidence SpaceX has a shot at perfecting the system in time to support NASA's planned Artemis moon landing, using a variant of the Starship, in 2028.

But that flight will require multiple Super Heavy-Starship tanker flights to fuel the lander for its flight to the moon before docking with a NASA Orion crew capsule, in lunar orbit, picking up two astronauts and carrying them down to the surface and back.

Getting the Starship safely into orbit will set the stage for follow-on test flights to demonstrate autonomous orbital refueling, a feat never before attempted at the scale required for Artemis moon landing missions.

The Super Heavy booster's 33 methane-burning Raptor engines ignited with a rush of flame at 8:49 a.m. EDT, quickly propelling the 400-foot-tall rocket away from SpaceX's Starbase launch…

Original source: https://www.cbsnews.com/entertainment/