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SpaceX Delays Launch Flight Test For Starship Of Orbital Rocket
The Guardian
|April 18, 2023
The largest and most powerful rocket ever built was readied and fuelled for its first test flight yesterday, but SpaceX cancelled the launch minutes before blast-off after discovering a pressurisation problem
"A pressurant valve appears to be frozen, so unless it starts operating soon, no launch today," the SpaceX founder, Elon Musk, wrote on Twitter. Minutes later, the launch was officially abandoned, with operators ending the countdown 40 seconds before lift-off.
SpaceX will need a minimum of two days to prepare the Starship rocket system for another attempt at orbital flight, which the company hopes will be the initial step on a human journey back to the moon and eventually Mars.
This story is from the April 18, 2023 edition of The Guardian.
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