SpaceX said Starship Flight 14 had two separate Raptor shutdowns on September 28, 2026, but the spacecraft reached orbit, deployed 26 Starlink V3 satellites and splashed down in the Pacific. A report published September 29 relayed a conditional warning that repairs delaying future flights could put pressure on Artemis’s schedule.
The two Raptor shutdowns on Flight 14
All 33 Raptor 3 engines on the Super Heavy booster ignited for liftoff; one shut down during the initial climb. Separately, one of Starship’s six upper-stage Raptors—a vacuum engine—shut down early during ascent. The other five burned longer to compensate.
How Starship still reached orbit
After evaluating the vehicle, flight controllers judged the three sea-level Raptors needed for later burns healthy and approved orbital operations. Starship then used one sea-level Raptor for orbit insertion, making Flight 14 its first orbital flight.
Starship deployed all 26 Starlink V3 satellites, and SpaceX said contact was made with each soon afterward. As a precaution after the ascent engine issue, the flight team shortened the time in orbit. Starship performed its first deorbit burn and splashed down in the Pacific; Super Heavy splashed down in the Gulf of Mexico. SpaceX said the booster’s flight termination system was triggered after landing-burn shutdown as a demonstration of the safety hardware.
The conditional Artemis schedule warning
A September 29 report relayed an aerospace engineer’s conditional warning: repairs that delay future flights could consume schedule time relevant to Artemis. The report described an Artemis III low-Earth-orbit rehearsal planned for summer 2027 and NASA’s goal of returning astronauts to the lunar surface by 2028.
