A crowd in South Texas watches the second-ever test flight of SpaceX's giant Starship vehicle on Nov. 18, 2023. (Image credit: SpaceX)

Space fans could be in for a holiday treat.

2023 年 11 月 18 日，德州南部的一群人觀看 SpaceX 巨型星際飛船的第二次試飛。（圖片來源：SpaceX）太空迷們可以享受一場節日盛宴。

SpaceX's third Starship vehicle "should be ready to fly in 3 to 4 weeks," company founder and CEO Elon Musk said via X (formerly known as Twitter) on Sunday (Nov. 19).

週日（11 月19 日），SpaceX 公司創始人兼執行長馬斯克透過X（以前稱為Twitter）表示，SpaceX 的第三艘星際飛船「應該在3 到4 週內準備好飛行」。

That would place technical readiness before Christmas — but there's no guarantee Starship will be cleared for liftoff by then. SpaceX still needs to secure a launch license from the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), which is overseeing an investigation into what happened Saturday (Nov. 18) during Starship's second-ever test flight.

這將在聖誕節前做好技術準備，但不能保證到那時星際飛船就能順利升空。 SpaceX 仍需要獲得美國聯邦航空管理局 (FAA) 的發射許可證，該管理局正在監督對週六（11 月 18 日）Starship 第二次試飛期間發生的事件進行調查。

Related: SpaceX's 2nd Starship launch test looks amazing in these stunning photos and videos

相關：SpaceX 的第二艘星際飛船發射測試在這些令人驚嘆的照片和影片中看起來令人驚嘆

Saturday's mission, which lifted off from SpaceX's Starbase site in South Texas, aimed to send Starship's upper stage most of the way around Earth, wrapping up with a splashdown in the Pacific Ocean near Hawaii 90 minutes after launch. 

週六的任務從 SpaceX 位於德克薩斯州南部的 Starbase 發射升空，旨在將 Starship 的上級送入地球大部分軌道，並在發射 90 分鐘後在夏威夷附近的太平洋濺落。

But the flight ended about eight minutes in, with a "rapid unscheduled disassembly" of the craft. That wasn't the only explosion of the day; Starship's huge Super Heavy first stage was supposed to come back to Earth for a splashdown in the Gulf of Mexico about seven minutes after liftoff, but it broke apart high in the sky just after separating from the upper stage.

但飛行大約八分鐘後就結束了，飛行器「迅速、意外地解體」。這並不是當天唯一的爆炸；星艦巨大的超重型第一級本應在升空後約七分鐘返回地球並在墨西哥灣濺落，但在與上級分離後，它在高空解體。

Starship did notch some important milestones on flight number two, however, and chief among them was successful stage separation, which did not occur on the vehicle's first test flight this past April. That debut flight ended just four minutes after launch, with a commanded detonation of the tumbling Starship vehicle.

然而，星際飛船在第二次飛行中取得了一些重要的里程碑，其中最主要的是成功的級分離，而在今年四月的首次試飛中並沒有發生這種情況。首次飛行在發射後僅四分鐘就結束了，翻滾的星艦飛行器受指令爆炸。

In addition, a handful of Super Heavy's 33 Raptor engines conked out early during the April flight, whereas all of them appeared to burn for the proper duration on Saturday. Starbase's orbital launch mount also seemed to emerge unscathed this weekend, whereas the April launch blasted out a big crater beneath it.

此外，Super Heavy 的 33 台猛禽發動機在 4 月的飛行中早些時候就熄火了，而周六所有發動機似乎都燃燒了適當的時間。 Starbase 的軌道發射架在本週末似乎也毫髮無傷，而四月的發射在其下方炸出了一個大坑。

Shortly after the April 20 flight, Musk said SpaceX would be ready to launch Starship again in just six to eight weeks. 

4 月 20 日的飛行後不久，馬斯克表示 SpaceX 將在短短六到八週內準備好再次發射 Starship。

It ended up taking much longer than that for the vehicle to get off the ground, of course. The FAA didn't grant a launch license until Nov. 15, after it had wrapped up an investigation into the explosion and conducted a safety review as well as an environmental assessment.

當然，最終車輛離開地面所需的時間比這要長得多。美國聯邦航空局 (FAA) 直到 11 月 15 日才發放發射許可證，此前該機構已經完成了對爆炸的調查並進行了安全審查和環境評估。

It's unclear when the agency's investigation into Saturday's flight will end; it just got underway, after all. But, given the progress SpaceX made with flight two compared to flight one, it would be surprising if there's another seven-month gap between Starship liftoffs.

目前尚不清楚該機構對週六航班的調查何時結束；畢竟一切才剛開始。但是，考慮到 SpaceX 在第二次飛行中所取得的進展與第一次飛行相比，如果 Starship 升空之間再有七個月的差距，那將是令人驚訝的。

SpaceX certainly seems to be gearing up for an increased test-flight cadence. "There are three ships in final production in the [Starbase] high bay (as can be seen from the highway)," Musk said in the Sunday X post.

SpaceX 似乎正在為加快試飛節奏做準備。 「[Starbase]高灣區有三艘太空船正在進行最終生產（從高速公路上可以看到），」馬斯克在 Sunday X 帖子中說道。