Starship: Flight 8 Mishap Findings and What to Expect from Flight 9

SpaceX’s eighth integrated Starship flight test on March 6, 2025, delivered a mix of breakthroughs and setbacks that are now driving targeted upgrades ahead of Flight 9, currently slated to lift off no earlier than Tuesday, May 27, at 23:30 UTC (6:30 p.m. CT).

Here’s a deep dive into what went right, what went wrong, and how SpaceX is refining both hardware and procedures for the next mission.

Flight 8: booster success, upper stage failure

At 5:30 p.m. CT, all 33 Raptor engines on the Super Heavy booster ignited and burned to completion, propelling Starship skyward from Starbase. After throttling down to the three center engines, Starship’s six Raptor engines ignited in the iconic hot-staging maneuver at T+02:40, separating cleanly from the booster.

The booster then relit 11 of its 13 Raptor engines to perform a boostback burn back toward the launch site. Upon return, 12 engines fired during the landing burn—including one engine that had failed to start for boostback—and the three center engines guided the booster into the chopstick arms, marking Super Heavy’s third successful catch.

*An onboard view from the Starship upper stage of Flight 8 right after stage separation. In the background the Super Heavy Booster doing its flip. Credits: SpaceX*

Post-flight analysis pointed the two engine no-starts during boostback and landing to torch igniter failures caused by local thermal conditions. SpaceX engineers replicated the fault in ground tests and added additional insulation around each igniter to ensure reliable relights on future flights.

Five and a half minutes into Starship’s ascent burn, a bright flash appeared in the aft “attic” section near one of the three center sea-level Raptor engines. The flash corresponded with a “sudden, energetic event” that destroyed that engine. Within ten seconds, both of the remaining center engines and one vacuum-optimized shut down, fatally compromising vehicle control. Telemetry ceased at T+09:30, and the Autonomous Flight Safety System triggered as expected according to SpaceX, breaking the vehicle apart.

Throughout Flight 8, Starship “flew within a designated launch corridor to safeguard the public both on the ground, on water, and in the air.” Immediately after the anomaly, SpaceX coordinated with the FAA, ATO, and Bahamian authorities to implement its contingency plan. All debris landed inside the pre-planned Debris Response Area, with no hazardous materials detected and no impact to marine life or water quality. A cleanup team was dispatched to survey and remove debris.

Root cause and remediations

Under FAA oversight, and with participation from NASA, the NTSB, and U.S. Space Force, SpaceX led an intensive investigation. The probable root cause for the ship loss was traced to an “hardware failure in one of the upper stage’s center Raptor engines that resulted in inadvertent propellant mixing and ignition.”

Since the mishap, SpaceX has run more than 100 long-duration Raptor firings at its McGregor testing facility, according to the company’s update, to isolate the failure mode. Several upgrades have been made to the next Ship to address the weak points observed during Flight 8.

First of all, critical flanges and seals in the engines received “increased preload torque” to prevent leaks. Since the beginnning of the Starship program SpaceX had serious problems with Raptors leaking pretty much wherever they could. They tried to overcome this problem iterating on engine versions and productions but it seems that they didn’t won the battle yet.

Ship 35 undergoing its long duration static fire test at SpaceX's Massey's test site in Starbase, TX. Credits: SpaceX — *Ship 35 undergoing its long duration static fire test at SpaceX’s Massey’s test site in Starbase, TX. Credits: SpaceX*

Then, a dedicated nitrogen purge system, similar to the one already in use for the Super Heavy engines section, will continuously purge the Starship’s engines bay, displacing any stray propellants before they can accumulate. Additionally, an enhanced drain lines will hopefully help to address the problem.

Future flights will introduce the next-generation Raptor 3 engine, which features lots of improvements and could finally be the end of this engine problems saga. Meanwhile, the torch igniter issue on the Super Heavy Booster has already been fixed, according to SpaceX.

SpaceX also underlined that the failure of Flight 8 was different than the one they had on Flight 7:

“While the failure manifested at a similar point in the flight timeline, it is worth noting that the failures are distinctly different. The mitigations put in place after Starship’s seventh flight test to address harmonic response and flammability of the ship’s attic section worked as designed prior to the failure on Flight 8.“

Flight 9: first reflight and new experiments

Flight 9 will be the first time a flight-proven Super Heavy booster—originally flown on Flight 7—returns to service for a second time. After post-flight inspections, the booster will fly again with 29 of its original 33 engines; single-use ablative heat shield panels have been replaced, while the rest of the hardware remains flight-proven. This reuse milestone is critical to SpaceX’s goal of daily launch cadence.

Booster 14 and Ship 35 stacked on SpaceX's Starbase Launch Pad A ahead of Flight 9. Credits: SpaceX — *Booster 14 and Ship 35 stacked on SpaceX’s Starbase Launch Pad A ahead of Flight 9. Credits: SpaceX*

On this flight, the booster will radically change its flight profile compared to previous tests. This time, it will remain on a trajectory to a safe splashdown in the Gulf of Mexico rather than attempting a catch.

SpaceX engineers will conduct key experiments during descent, starting with a flip in a controlled direction by selectively blocking vents on the hotstage adapter. The booster will flip in a precise, preprogrammed direction, in contrast with previous flips that went in a randomized direction based on small differences in thrust from Starship ignition. This will help saving fuel thus increasing payload capacity.

Then, the booster will fly at a higher angle of attack during its descent, raising drag to slow its descent speed. Data on attitude control and drag performance at these angles will inform future booster recovery profiles.

Lastly, during the final burn, one of the three center engines will be intentionally disabled. The booster will then try to use a middle ring engine as a backup.It will then switch to two center engines for terminal descent, and is expected to make a hard splashdown.

Upper stage objectives

Starship’s upper stage will again fly a suborbital arc, this time aiming to complete objectives left unachieved on Flights 7 and 8.

Eight Starlink simulators—identical in size to next-generation satellites—will be released around 18 minutes into the mission, demonstrating Starship’s first payload mission capability. Then, a single Raptor will relight, proving out ignition under orbital conditions.

Large swaths of heat-shield tiles have been removed to expose the hull to extreme heating. Metallic tile prototypes—one variant with active cooling—will be evaluated alongside a smoothed, tapered tile edge designed to eliminate the hot spots seen on Flight 6.

Additionally, real catch fittings are mounted on the vehicle’s sides to measure thermal loads and structural strain in preparation for a future ship capture. Lastly, Starship will reenter at a flight profile that maximizes dynamic pressure on its rear flaps, pushing them to their structural limits and yielding critical data for flap material and hinge design.

We are in a pivotal moment for the Starship program: will it fail once again?