Elon Musk’s SpaceX postponed the 10th launch of its Starship rocket due to cloudy weather in Texas on Monday (August 25, 2025), another slight delay in its efforts to overcome development setbacks and achieve several long-sought milestones essential to the Mars rocket system’s reusable design.

The 71-metres tall Super Heavy booster and its 52-metres tall Starship upper half, which together make it taller than New York’s Statue of Liberty, sat on a launch mount at SpaceX’s Starbase rocket facilities ahead of liftoff time that had been moved back a few times because of gloomy weather.

The rocket was filled with millions of pounds of propellant and set to launch when SpaceX around 8:00 p.m. EST (0000 GMT) opted to call off the day’s launch and turn the operation into a launch rehearsal, considering the weather forecast would remain unfavourable throughout the launch window.

SpaceX will try to launch Starship on Tuesday (August 26, 2025) at 7:30 p.m. EST (2130 GMT).

A liquid oxygen leak at the Starship launchpad had nixed a Sunday (August 24, 2025) launch attempt, billionaire Musk wrote on X overnight, adding SpaceX would try again on Monday (August 25, 2025). Mr. Musk on Monday (August 25, 2025) appeared on SpaceX’s live stream for a brief chat about Starship’s design and its role in ferrying humans to Mars.

Development of SpaceX’s next-generation rocket, key to the company’s powerful launch business and Mr. Musk’s goal to send humans to Mars, has faced repeated hiccups this year.

NASA hopes to use the rocket as soon as 2027 for its first crewed moon landing since the Apollo program.

SpaceX’s Starlink satellite internet business, a major source of company revenue, is also tied to Starship’s success. Mr. Musk aims to use Starship to launch larger batches of Starlink satellites, which have so far been deployed by SpaceX’s workhorse Falcon 9 rocket, into space.

“In about 6 or 7 years, there will be days where Starship launches more than 24 times in 24 hours,” Mr. Musk said on Sunday (August 24, 2025), replying to a user on X.

This year, two Starship testing failures early in flight, another failure in space on its ninth flight, and a massive test stand explosion in June that sent debris flying into nearby Mexican territory have tested SpaceX’s capital-intensive test-to-failure development approach, in which new iterations of rocket prototypes are flown to their technical limits.

That ethos is markedly different from SpaceX’s rivals such as Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin, whose New Glenn rocket made an operational debut in January following years of on-the-ground development and testing. The new Vulcan rocket from United Launch Alliance, co-owned by Boeing and Lockheed Martin , had a similar upbringing before its 2024 debut.

With SpaceX’s approach, testing failures early in Starship’s flight prevent the company from gathering vital technical data needed to advance the rocket’s design.

Still, SpaceX, which Mr. Musk expects to record around $15.5 billion in revenue this year, has continued to swiftly produce new Starships for test flights at Starbase, a sprawling and rapidly growing rocket industrial complex. The area was made a municipality in May by local voters, many of them SpaceX workers.

Starship’s setbacks underscore the technical complexities of the latest iteration. The ship is packed with far more capabilities than predecessor models such as increased thrust, a potentially more resilient heat shield and stronger steering flaps crucial to nailing its atmospheric reentry — key traits of its rapidly reusable design that Musk has long pushed for.

SpaceX has a lengthy to-do list for Starship’s development before the rocket begins routine missions envisioned by Mr. Musk. That includes demonstrating safe returns from space, payload deployments in orbit and complex in-space propellant refuelling which is crucial to its moon mission assignments for NASA.

Whenever Starship can launch, the rocket system will liftoff from Texas and separate in half dozens of miles in altitude, with its Super Heavy booster returning for a water landing off the Texas coast, while Starship ignites its own engines to blast further into space.

In space, Starship will attempt to deploy mock Starlink satellites and reignite an engine along its suborbital path around the globe. Atmospheric reentry over the Indian Ocean will test its exterior steering flaps and an array of experimental heat shield tiles as the ship blazes through intense friction and heat.

Published – August 26, 2025 06:51 am IST

The SpaceX logo is displayed on a building, at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Fla.
| Photo Credit: AP

Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s recent meeting with SpaceX CEO Elon Musk has sparked significant interest, particularly given Mr Musk’s ambitions to expand his businesses in India. During Mr Modi’s visit to the U.S. to meet President Donald Trump, the two men met to discuss various issues, including space, mobility, technology, and innovation.

Mr Modi shared details of their meeting on X. This meeting marks another significant interaction between the two, following their previous encounter in New York in 2023. During that meeting, Mr Musk expressed confidence that Tesla would soon enter the Indian market, stating, “I’m confident that Tesla will be in India… as soon as humanly possible”.

Mr Musk’s meeting with Mr Modi was attended by his three young children, while Mr Modi was accompanied by his top advisers, including External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar and National Security Adviser Ajit Doval. Trump later commented on the meeting, assuming Mr Musk’s interest in doing business in India, saying, “I would imagine he met, possibly, because you know he’s running a company”.

According to India’s foreign ministry, Mr Modi and Mr Musk discussed strengthening collaboration between Indian and U.S. entities in innovation, space exploration, artificial intelligence, and sustainable development. They also touched on entrepreneurship and good governance.

Musk’s ambitions for Starlink in India

Mr Musk has long been a fan of Mr Modi and has been eager to introduce his Starlink satellite internet service to the Indian market, per AP.

However, Starlink’s entry into India has faced regulatory challenges, security concerns, and opposition from domestic telecom giants like Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Jio. In November last year, India’s telecoms minister, Jyotiraditya Scindia, stated that Starlink had yet to comply with security norms, and a license for satellite communications services would only be issued after meeting all requirements.

Mr Musk has criticised India’s policy of granting spectrum for satellite services through auctioning, but the Indian government later changed its policy, deciding to assign satellite spectrum instead of auctioning it.

Musk has interests in India’s untapped satellite broadband market

India’s satellite broadband service market is highly competitive, with at least six companies controlling the market, led by Ambani’s Reliance Jio.

About 6,900 active satellites of Mr Musk’s Starlink are orbiting Earth, providing low-latency broadband to some 4.6 million people. However, if Mr Musk wants to enter the Indian market, Starlink’s high pricing could become an issue. India has one of the cheapest rates of mobile data globally and Ambani’s Jio once gave

Despite this, at least 40% of India’s population still lacks access to the internet.

Tesla is waiting to enter India

Tesla has been waiting to enter India as it is the world’s largest automobile market, but because of the high import duties on vehicles, it has faced hurdles. Moreover India’s electric market is still new and made up only about 2% of the total car sales last year. But the government is trying to push that number up to 30% by 2030. Additionally India’s new policy of extending concessional tariffs on fully imported electric vehicles made by foreign carmakers who start local manufacturing is also appealing.

In related news, Tesla is preparing to establish its presence in India, with the company’s visit to India and site selection process underway. Tesla’s entry into the Indian market is expected to bring numerous benefits, including providing Indian consumers with access to advanced electric vehicles, creating job opportunities, and contributing to the growth and development of the Indian electric vehicle industry.
 

Washington DC:

Billionaire Elon Musk on Tuesday (local time) said that US President Donald Trump had asked him to facilitate the return of the two Boeing Starliner astronauts Sunita Williams and Butch Wilmore, who have been on the space station since June 2024, as soon as possible.

The SpaceX CEO claimed that it was “terrible” that the pair were left “stranded” at the International Space Station (ISS) by former President Joe Biden’s administration for so long, even though NASA had already roped in SpaceX months ago to return both astronauts as part of its Crew-9 mission.

“The @POTUS has asked @SpaceX to bring home the 2 astronauts stranded on the @Space_Station as soon as possible. We will do so,” Musk said in a post on X.

The @POTUS has asked @SpaceX to bring home the 2 astronauts stranded on the @Space_Station as soon as possible. We will do so.

Terrible that the Biden administration left them there so long.

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) January 28, 2025

“Terrible that the Biden administration left them there so long,” he added.

NASA has continuously said that astronauts are not stranded and that they are healthy, and in good spirits.

Butch Wilmore and Sunita Williams launched to the ISS aboard Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft in June 2024. The flight, which was intended to last only 10 days, experienced a rocky journey. After arriving at the space station, NASA and Boeing worked for weeks to better understand the problems in the spacecraft but it was ultimately decided that it was too risky to return the Startliner with the crew.

Following this, in August 2024, the space agency announced that it had asked SpaceX to bring Williams and Wilmore home aboard the SpaceX Crew-9 capsule. The two astronauts were slotted into Crew-9, with NASA removing two of the four crew members who were set to launch on the SpaceX Dragon in September.

Instead, only an astronaut and cosmonaut were launched aboard that flight to make room for Williams and Wilmore, who were set to return home at the end of the expedition in February of 2025.

However, there was another delay in December, because SpaceX needed more time to work on the latest Dragon spacecraft, which will be debuting with the launch of Crew-10.

That meant Crew-9, including the two Boeing astronauts, would not be back home until late March after Crew-10 reached the ISS.

But Musk’s latest post suggested that the Crew Dragon capsule, named ‘Freedom,’ may make an early departure from the ISS, with Wilmore and Williams onboard.

If there is a leader in the aerospace industry, SpaceX is it. The company’s Crew Dragon and Cargo Dragon spacecrafts are the current go-to vehicles to deliver astronauts and supplies to the International Space Station.

NASA contracts awarded to SpaceX through 2030 alone are worth nearly US$5 billion and include research and development for the Artemis mission to return astronauts to the Moon.

Over the past decade, SpaceX has also emerged as a key vendor to the U.S. Department of Defense, seen most recently with a $733.5 million contract for projects such as launching defense satellite networks and contributing to other national security space objectives.

As a human geographer, I’m interested in how commercial space and defense companies affect the local communities where they conduct launches and tests.

For instance, I spent over two years in Kazakhstan researching the privatization of the Soviet space program and the beginning of a global commercial space industry.

Elon Musk and SpaceX’s influence

Politically, SpaceX is an enormous boon to the United States.

As a U.S.-based defense supplier and contractor, the company’s technology has helped to nearly end an almost two-decade dependency on the Russian Federation for access to the International Space Station. Its billionaire CEO, Elon Musk, has even expressed plans to colonize Mars.

Musk’s decision to spend $250 million helping Donald Trump win the 2024 presidential election is expected to lead to more support for SpaceX.

In the new administration, Musk is poised to lead a newly created advisory agency called the Department of Government Efficiency, which could lead to benefits for his business and widen his space ambitions.

Boca Chica, Texas, is home to SpaceX’s flagship assembly and test installation, Starbase. Since 2021, I have been conducting research with environmental groups and multigenerational community members of Latino and Indigenous descent in south Texas who see space exploration as a landscape-altering industry that affects their well-being.

After watching Starbase’s development proceed since 2014, locals there told me that there is much unseen and unsaid about what happens on the ground while an aerospace giant shoots for the stars.

Breaking eggs to make an omelet

Starbase is an industrial installation built by SpaceX to fabricate and test a number of the company’s rocket types.

The area around it is a unique and delicate ecosystem that includes estuaries and coastal grasslands, mud flats and more, where falcons, hawks, ravens, gulls and songbirds live.

Since construction began, SpaceX engineers have had to drain water-logged soils, level them and pour concrete to support ground tracking stations, assembly buildings, engine test stands, a nearly 500-foot (152-meter) launch tower and onsite fuel mixing and storage.

In a lengthy response to local environmental groups’ claims of environmental abuses, the company maintains that it is dedicated to environmental stewardship.

But developing rockets is a dangerous and messy business. Sites chosen for this kind of work are often, though not always, remote and highly secured installations.

Fiery explosions on the ground or in the air aren’t unheard of over the past several years. Rocket tests in Scotland, China and Japan have all ended in accidents.

In April 2023, one of SpaceX’s prototype Starship rockets exploded over the Gulf of Mexico shortly after liftoff.

This is not the only time that a rocket has exploded at places where SpaceX operates.

SpaceX runs a compact though growing operation at Boca Chica that has transformed the area. The hamlet was previously known as Kopernik Shores, and SpaceX purchased nearly all of the approximately 35 ranch homes in the area. Some residents have reported pressure to sell their property for suboptimal prices following rumors that the county would use eminent domain to seize their residences.

I spoke to Rebekah Hinojosa, a local activist and member of the Carrizo-Comecrudo Tribe of Texas, while researching in the area. To many locals, including Hinojosa, it seems like Musk is so well connected that SpaceX is insulated from public criticism.

In a 2018 press conference, Musk said, “We’ve got a lot of land with no one around, and so if it blows up, it’s cool,” referring to a rocket he planned to test at Starbase.

Changes to the landscape

An installation the size of Starbase cannot avoid disturbing the wildlife in the four distinct state and federal wildlife protection areas that surround it.

If you walk through the protected areas you may see shrapnel, segments of rocket chassis and other random debris from any number of explosions – that is, if someone else hasn’t picked them up first.

In December 2022, I visited a luxury campground near Starbase. It displayed various fragments of rocket debris, which they called memorabilia to the new space age, throughout the site.

Within SpaceX, as well as NASA, the explosion of 2023 was celebrated as a crucial step in developing the Starship rocket. The event did produce valuable data on the rocket’s performance – it has done little to tarnish the company’s reputation.

There is tremendous support for SpaceX in Texas. The company has promised to drive high-tech industry jobs into a region ranked among the country’s poorest.

SpaceX has created about 2,100 jobs. However, reporting shows that local and state politicians have seen more personal gains in their real estate holdings and campaign budgets than the region’s economy has overall.

A laboratory near the community

At the end of the day, to develop a rocket, you need a place to test your design.

“Our local beach is the laboratory,” local activist Hinojosa told me.

Resident coalitions of Indigenous, Latino and Chicano people as well as conservation groups are suing the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, the Federal Aviation Administration and others to combat SpaceX.

These groups argue that SpaceX misled state and federal regulators about Starbase’s operations. They claim SpaceX changed how frequently it planned to launch tests and built new facilities for several rocket types, which rendered the company’s original environmental impact statement for the area inaccurate.

Some key issues these groups are fighting against include a bid to expand Starbase into more protected areas. Another point of contention is the deluge system, which creates thousands of gallons of toxic wastewater to cool launch pads and rocket engines after testing.

While the EPA and the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality have notified SpaceX about violations of the Clean Water Act, claimants in a recent lawsuit contend that these agencies have not held the company accountable for breaking the law. The company has denied any wrongdoing and refutes claims of environmental harms.

“As we have built up capacity to launch and developed new sites across the country, we have always been committed to public safety and mitigating impacts to the environment,” a SpaceX statement reads. “The list of measures we take just for operations in Texas is over two hundred items long, including constant monitoring and sampling of the short and long-term health of local flora and fauna. The narrative that we operate free of, or in defiance of, environmental regulation is demonstrably false.”

So, what does the future hold? Many people from conservation agencies, activist groups and Indigenous communities in Texas want the company out. Given the high public support for space exploration in the U.S. and the burgeoning friendship between Musk and Trump, a SpaceX evacuation from the area seems unlikely.

While it may take difficult negotiations that require concessions from each party, I hope that somewhere there is a middle ground on which space exploration and environmental protections can coexist.

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article here.

New Delhi:

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday said India’s first private satellite constellation by Pixxel Space showcases the exceptional talent of the country’s youngsters.

Bengaluru-based space startup Pixxel has scripted history by launching the country’s first private constellation of earth-imaging satellites, Firefly, making a grand entry into the fast-emerging field of hyper-spectral imaging.

“India’s first private satellite constellation by Pixxel Space showcases the exceptional talent of India’s youth and highlights the expanding capabilities of our private sector in the space industry,” the prime minister said in a post on X.

A SpaceX rocket launched three of Pixxel’s six Firefly satellites on January 14 from California in the United States. The satellites are the world’s highest-resolution commercial-grade hyperspectral satellites with the capability to observe the earth in over 150 bands, a technology that is useful in sectors as diverse as agriculture and defence.

Pixxel announced after the launch that all the three satellites have successfully deployed solar panels, de-tumbled and stabilised, achieved sun-pointing, and established seamless two-way communications.

“They’re alive, working, and ready for the next phase. Onward to unlocking their full potential,” Pixxel Space said in a post on X.

(This story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)

Washington, United States:

A SpaceX Starship prototype failed in space minutes after launching from Texas on Thursday, forcing airline flights over the Gulf of Mexico to alter course to avoid falling debris and setting back Elon Musk’s flagship rocket program.

SpaceX mission control lost contact with the newly upgraded Starship, carrying its first test payload of mock satellites, eight minutes after liftoff from its South Texas rocket facilities at 5:38 p.m. EST (2238 GMT).

Video shot by Reuters showed orange balls of light streaking across the sky over the Haitian capital of Port-Au-Prince, leaving trails of smoke behind.

“We did lose all communications with the ship – that is essentially telling us we had an anomaly with the upper stage,” SpaceX Communications Manager Dan Huot said, confirming minutes later that the ship was lost.

The last time a Starship upper stage failed was in March last year, as it was reentering Earth’s atmosphere over the Indian Ocean, but rarely has a SpaceX mishap caused widespread disruptions to air traffic.

At Miami International Airport, some flights were grounded, according to a Reuters witness. At least 20 commercial flights diverted to other airports or altered course to avoid potential debris, based on flight records from tracking website FlightRadar24. The Federal Aviation Administration, which regulates private launch activities, said it was assessing the situation.

SpaceX CEO Musk posted a video on X showing the debris field and said: “Success is uncertain, but entertainment is guaranteed!”

The Starship upper stage, 2 meters (6.56 feet) taller than previous versions, was a “new generation ship with significant upgrades,” SpaceX said in a mission description prior to the test. It was due to make a controlled splashdown in the Indian Ocean roughly an hour after its launch from Texas.

Mechazilla has caught the Super Heavy booster! pic.twitter.com/aq91TloYzY

— SpaceX (@SpaceX) January 16, 2025

The mission was SpaceX’s seventh Starship test since 2023 in Musk’s multibillion-dollar effort to build a rocket capable of ferrying humans and cargo to Mars, as well as deploying large batches of satellites into Earth’s orbit.

SpaceX’s test-to-failure development approach has in the past included spectacular failures as the company pushes Starship prototypes to their engineering limits. Thursday’s test failure, though, occurred in a mission phase that SpaceX has flown through previously.

The towering Super Heavy booster, meanwhile, returned to its launchpad roughly seven minutes after liftoff, as planned, slowing its descent from space by reigniting its Raptor engines as it hooked itself on giant mechanical arms fixed to a launch tower.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

Starlink, SpaceX’s satellite network designed to deliver affordable internet to remote areas, may not be as secure as believed. A group of renowned Chinese scientists recently simulated a space mission aimed at targeting the massive satellite constellation, according to the South China Morning Post.

Results from the computer simulation showed that China could effectively approach nearly 1,400 Starlink satellites within 12 hours using just 99 Chinese satellites. These could be equipped with lasers, microwaves, and other devices to conduct reconnaissance, tracking, or other operations.

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“The potential military application value of the Starlink megaconstellation has been highlighted in the Russia-Ukraine conflict. In recent years, the militarisation of space has intensified, posing a significant threat to China’s space security. It is particularly important to track and monitor its operational status,” wrote the project team led by Wu Yunhua, director of the aerospace control department at Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics. Their peer-reviewed paper was published on January 3 in the Chinese academic journal Systems Engineering and Electronics.

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According to SCMP, SpaceX, founded by Elon Musk, has launched more than 6,700 Starlink satellites and is expected to increase that number into the tens of thousands in the coming years.

According to Space.com, Starlink satellites have a lifespan of approximately five years, and SpaceX eventually hopes to have as many as 42,000 satellites in this so-called megaconstellation.

Berlin:

U.S. billionaire Elon Musk’s support for Germany’s far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) is a “logical and systematic” play for a weak Europe that will not be able to regulate as strongly, Vice Chancellor Robert Habeck said in his New Year’s address.

The calls by Musk are not made out of ignorance, said Habeck, who is the chancellor candidate for the Greens party in German national elections due in February.

“It is logical and systematic. Musk is strengthening those who are weakening Europe. A weak Europe is in the interest of those for whom regulation is an inappropriate limitation of their power,” added Habeck.

The German government on Monday accused Musk, who owns social media platform X and is CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, of trying to influence the upcoming election with a guest opinion piece for the Welt am Sonntag newspaper.

Musk, the world’s richest person, spent more than $250 million to help Trump get elected and has been tasked by Trump to prune the federal budget as a special adviser.

Musk endorsed the AfD as Germany’s last hope in the piece that prompted the commentary editor to resign in protest, praising the anti-establishment, anti-immigrant party’s approach to regulation, taxes and market deregulation.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

Elon Musk’s SpaceX successfully completed its sixth flight test of the Starship spacecraft on Wednesday. The uncrewed mission, launched from SpaceX’s Starbase in Texas, saw the Starship spacecraft achieve a suborbital trajectory before reentering over the Indian Ocean, while the Super Heavy booster executed a planned ocean splashdown.

“Splashdown confirmed! Congratulations to the entire SpaceX team on an exciting sixth flight test of Starship!” SpaceX announced on X (formerly known as Twitter).

Splashdown confirmed! Congratulations to the entire SpaceX team on an exciting sixth flight test of Starship! pic.twitter.com/bf98Va9qmL

— SpaceX (@SpaceX) November 19, 2024

US President-elect Donald Trump also observed the launch alongside SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, reported CNN.

The nearly 400-foot-tall Starship system, composed of the Starship spacecraft and its Super Heavy booster, launched during a 30-minute window starting at 3:30 am IST. The goal was to test the system’s limits, including a more aggressive reentry angle for Starship and the ignition of its Raptor engines in space. 

While the Super Heavy booster was slated for a precision landing on the company’s launch tower arms – nicknamed “Mechazilla” – SpaceX concluded that conditions were unfavourable and went for a safe splashdown in the Gulf of Mexico instead, the CNN report added. 

This flight represents critical progress toward Starship’s role in NASA’s Artemis programme, which aims to return astronauts to the Moon by 2026. The spacecraft will serve as a lunar lander for the mission, with plans for future flights involving complex docking manoeuvres and fuel transfers in orbit.

“Congrats to SpaceX on Starship’s sixth test flight. Exciting to see the Raptor engine restart in space—major progress towards orbital flight. Starship’s success is Artemis’ success. Together, we will return humanity to the Moon and set our sights on Mars,” NASA Administrator Bill Nelson wrote on X.

Congrats to @SpaceX on Starship’s sixth test flight. Exciting to see the Raptor engine restart in space—major progress towards orbital flight.

Starship’s success is #Artemis‘ success. Together, we will return humanity to the Moon & set our sights on Mars. pic.twitter.com/tuwpGOvT9S

— Bill Nelson (@SenBillNelson) November 19, 2024

This test flight incorporated new challenges, such as operating Starship with reduced protective shielding and pushing the flaps – some key components for atmospheric reentry – to their stress limits.

SpaceX engineer Kate Tice talked about the importance of testing under extreme conditions. “Turns out the vehicle had more capability than our calculations predicted, and that is why we test like we fly,” she was quoted as saying by CNN.

Looking ahead, SpaceX plans long-duration flight tests and propellant transfer demonstrations in 2025, which will be significant for the Artemis III mission. These tests involve complex logistics, such as refuelling Starship in orbit to sustain lunar missions.