SpaceX's Starship fires up its engines after suffering a new delay

SpaceX's Starship's first orbital test flight has been delayed, but work is still underway.

Starship's first orbital test flight hinges upon SpaceX's South Texas launch site, Starbase, passing a programmatic environmental assessment (PEA) conducted by the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). This assessment was to be completed by December 31st, 2021; however, this has been pushed back. The FAA announced on December 28th that the assessment is now due to be completed by February 28th, 2022.

The test flight was targeted for January or February but now will occur no earlier than March. In the meantime, Starship testing will continue, with the latest testing taking place on December 29th. The Starship SN20 (Serial Number 20) prototype has fired its engines in a "static fire" test at Starbase. The spacecraft remained anchored to the ground while its Raptor engines were ignited briefly.

All six engines have been fired in a previous static fire test on November 12th, but it's not yet known if they were all used in this test. You can view the livestream recording of the test on NASASpaceflight's YouTube channel.