Nouveau vol test sous pression de la mégafusée Starship d’Elon Musk

The Starship megarocket that Elon Musk is building to fly to the Moon and Mars was launched Monday for a new pressurized test flight, with more and more voices rising against development delays that could cost the United States its lunar dream.

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The colossal rocket, more than 120 meters tall, rose into the Texas sky in a thick cloud of smoke around 6:25 pm PT. (23:25 GMT).

This eleventh test flight came a year after the rocket's fifth test flight, during which SpaceX was the first to catch fuel using mechanical arms.

However, since this impressive feat, Starship has suffered several technical setbacks, most notably in early 2025, when flights were plagued by mid-air explosions.

Although its latest launch in August was successful, Elon Musk has been unable to quell growing criticism from experts who say the rocket may not be ready on time.

In theory, it should launch missions to Mars from 2026 and allow Americans to return to the Moon in 2027, but those deadlines are looking increasingly difficult to meet as, in Elon Musk's own words, there are still “thousands of technical problems” to be resolved.

These include refueling a rocket in space and recovering a ship. There are so many extremely difficult maneuvers that will not be attempted on Monday and will not catch up with the engine.

Instead, SpaceX planned to conduct various tests in the air before the two stages of the rocket hit the water.

“Space Race”

“We are on the verge of losing the Moon,” three former senior NASA officials warned in a SpaceNews column in September, while a panel of independent experts estimated that at this rate, a modified version of Starship intended for use as a lunar lander could be “years” late.

“It is very unlikely that we will go to the moon before China,” said Jim Bridenstine, the former head of NASA, also testifying before a Senate committee urging Washington to come up with a Plan B.

The stakes are all the more important as the Trump administration openly talks about a “second space race,” following the race between the United States and the Soviet Union during the Cold War.

However, the Artemis 3 mission, which plans to return Americans to lunar soil, is based in part on the Starship rocket, which has demonstrated its ability to make interplanetary travel in complete safety, which is not yet the case.

Despite the upcoming technical problems and delays, Elon Musk continues to show his confidence. Donald Trump's former ally is betting on a risky strategy: launching multiple prototypes to gradually work out in-flight problems.

If this mantra has brought him success, his overly optimistic forecasts and broken promises now worry observers, as does the fact that he has repeatedly called for favoring Mars, his obsession, over the Moon.