According to NASA, Starship‘s third flight test will feature a major demonstration needed for the overall success of landing humans on the Moon with the Artemis program. In a meeting, slides showed Starship Flight 3 being the first mission to demonstrate in-orbit propellent transfer. However, the schedule is still up in the air.

Starship Flight 3 could be big for Artemis

In a meeting on Monday, the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, which is conducting a study of NASA’s critical workforce, infrastructure, and technology, met with several NASA officials to go over the agency’s Moon to Mars program, including Artemis.

스타십 플라이트 3(Starship Flight 3)는 아르테미스에게 큰 도움이 될 수 있습니다. 월요일 회의에서 NASA의 중요한 인력, 인프라 및 기술에 대한 연구를 수행하고 있는 국립 과학, 공학 및 의학 아카데미는 여러 NASA 관계자와 만나 기관의 달을 검토했습니다. 아르테미스를 포함한 화성 프로그램에.

Lakiesha Hawkins, NASA’s Deputy Assistant Associate Administrator for the agency’s Moon to Mars program, gave an update across all of the in-space hardware it is developing. This ranged from the xEVA suits by Axiom and Collins, to Gateway, Orion, and the Human Landing System.

The update shared brief updates for where each HLS providers are in their development of their respective landers. For Blue Origin, who just recent received their contract, the company has already delivered its mock up to the agency. For SpaceX it looks like the company will complete the first tank-to-tank transfer of cryogenic propellent in orbit on Flight 3.

이 업데이트는 각 HLS 제공업체가 각 착륙선 개발에서 어디에 있는지에 대한 간략한 업데이트를 공유했습니다. 최근 계약을 체결한 블루오리진의 경우 이미 소속사에 모형을 전달한 상태다. SpaceX의 경우 회사는 Flight 3의 궤도에서 극저온 추진제의 탱크 간 이동을 최초로 완료할 것으로 보입니다.

While Russia regularly refuels the ISS with hypergolic propellents, these can be stored at pretty much any temperatures for months or years on end. Cryogenic propellents, which are much more efficient, usually can’t last for more than a few hours in space before they boil off.

For both of NASA’s HLS landers, they will need to develop technologies to extend the lifespan of their propellents, SpaceX with methane and oxygen and Blue Origin with hydrogen and oxygen, as well as transferring it between spacecraft in orbit.

NASA의 HLS 착륙선 모두 추진체의 수명을 연장하는 기술, 즉 메탄과 산소를 ​​사용하는 SpaceX와 수소와 산소를 사용하는 Blue Origin을 궤도에 있는 우주선 사이에 전송하는 기술을 개발해야 합니다.

While Starship Flight 3 won’t feature any vehicle-to-vehicle refueling, it will begin the journey to that with a tank-to-tank transfer of liquid oxygen. How we expect this to happen is once in its coast phase, SpaceX will move 10 metric tons of propellent from the Starship upper stage’s main tank to its header tank located at the nose of the vehicle.

While small compared to the 15 or so tanker spacecraft needed to refuel an entire Starship HLS lander, this test is a big step forward in developing a required technology for NASA’s Artemis 3 landing. Without it, there is no chance of completing any landings in the agency’s timelines.

The timeline however is still fluid

Just like the propellents that have to be stored at hundreds of degrees below zero, Starship’s third flight schedule is very fluid.

그러나 타임라인은 여전히 ​​유동적이다. 영하 수백도에 보관해야 하는 추진제처럼 스타쉽의 3차 비행 일정도 매우 유동적이다.

Elon Musk has said that it wants hardware ready to fly sometime this month, however we haven’t seen any stages begin testing at the launch site just yet. Work though is moving forward on a lot of the final V1 Starship upper stages in Starbase’s high bay. The company is also working through refurbishment work at the launch site after November’s flight.

SpaceX will have to wait once again for the FAA to close out its mishap investigation into Starship’s second flight before moving forward with a third. A NASA spokesperson has shared with the media that the tank-to-tank test is only a possibility, and could be pushed to a later flight.

Right now, SpaceX’s primary mission is to get Starship through its flight profile, which ends with a splash down off the coast of Hawaii. Flight 2 saw major improvements and met the company’s milestones of a clean stage separation and improved reliability of the Raptor engines in flight. But both stages still exploded shortly after showing those improvements.

현재 SpaceX의 주요 임무는 Starship의 비행 프로필을 통과하도록 하는 것이며, 이는 하와이 해안에서 물보라로 끝나는 것입니다. Flight 2에서는 큰 개선이 이루어졌으며 깔끔한 스테이지 분리와 비행 중 Raptor 엔진의 신뢰성 향상이라는 회사의 이정표를 달성했습니다. 그러나 두 단계 모두 이러한 개선 사항이 나타난 직후 폭발적으로 나타났습니다.

While there is plenty of forward movement on Starship’s development, NASA has the goal to land astronauts on the Moon’s surface with Artemis 3 in 2026. A date that is unlikely to be met due to several programs being behind schedule, including Starship.

스타쉽 개발에 많은 진전이 있는 반면, NASA는 2026년에 아르테미스 3호를 이용해 우주비행사를 달 표면에 착륙시키는 목표를 가지고 있습니다. 스타쉽을 포함한 여러 프로그램이 예정보다 늦어져 달성하기 어려운 날짜입니다.