SpaceX ready to send Starship Flight 14 to orbit in milestone launch

SpaceX is set to send its giant Starship rocket on its first orbital flight attempt early Monday, September 28, 2026.

According to SpaceX’s website, the 75-minute launch window begins at 8:15 a.m. ET from its headquarters in Starbase, Texas.

It will be SpaceX's first attempt to send Starship into orbit, allowing the company to deploy its first batch of new generation Starlink satellites.

Since 2023, SpaceX has made 13 attempts, with nearly half of its various prototypes of Starship ending in mid-air explosions.

The company in a blog post on September 15 acknowledged that it had intentionally placed Starship in a passively safe suborbital trajectory for its past 13 test flights.

This meant that “even if control over the spacecraft was completely lost, it was already on a path to reenter the atmosphere and splash down in a predetermined location.”

The Federal Aviation Administration has issued a “license authorization for the ScaceX Starship Super Heavy Flight 14 launch and reentry on September 26.

With the 14th test flight of Starship, Elon Musk’s aerospace company is eyeing to deploy 26 of its new Starlink V3 satellites.

Starship is critical to SpaceX’s expansion plans, as the company is counting on the giant rocket to scale its Starlink business, as it’s the largest and only profitable segment as of the second quarter.

Currently, SpaceX operates around 11,000 active satellites in orbit today.

While outlining future plans, Musk said during SpaceX’s earnings call in August that “It’s not out of the question that at some point, Starlink will deliver a majority of the world’s internet, at least in countries where we’re allowed to operate, which is the vast majority of countries.”

SpaceX went public in June in what is described as the largest IPO on record and is now valued at about $2 trillion.

The company has manufactured its Starship Super Heavy rocket and booster to be fully resuable, and to lift more cargo for less cost into orbit than any prior spacecraft.

The key to remember is that none of the previous 13 test flights were designed to make it to orbit.

But with Starship’s 14th flight, SpaceX has pinned its hopes on it circling the planet.