SpaceX's giant Starship rocket is poised to head for space from South Texas.

SpaceX 的巨型 Starship 火箭準備從德克薩斯州南部飛往太空。

BOCA CHICA BEACH, Texas—Early Saturday morning, SpaceX will load more than 10 million pounds of super-cold methane and liquid oxygen into the propellant tanks inside the company's second flight-ready Super Heavy booster and Starship rocket.

德州博卡奇卡海灘——週六清晨，SpaceX 將把超過1000 萬磅的超冷甲烷和液態氧裝入該公司第二個可飛行的超重型助推器和Starship 火箭內的推進劑罐中。

Then, if all goes according to plan, 33 Raptor engines will light at 7 am CST (13:00 UTC) to propel this gigantic rocket into the sky over Boca Chica Beach, a remote stretch of South Texas shoreline a couple of miles north of the US-Mexico border. SpaceX will live stream the event on X.

然後，如果一切按計劃進行，33 個猛禽發動機將在中部標準時間上午7 點（世界標準時間13:00）啟動，將這枚巨大的火箭推向博卡奇卡海灘上空，博卡奇卡海灘是德州南部海岸線以北幾英里的一個偏遠地區。美國和墨西哥邊境。 SpaceX 將在 X 上直播此活動。

Space fans got what they hope will be their last look at this particular rocket Friday night, hours before law enforcement closed off public access to the launch site. One of the neat things about SpaceX's privately-owned South Texas launch site, named Starbase, is the public can approach within a few hundred feet of the rocket. The surrounding mud flats, dunes, and beach are all public land.

星期五晚上，太空迷們希望這是他們最後一次看到這枚特殊的火箭，就在執法部門關閉公眾進入發射場的幾個小時之前。 SpaceX 位於德克薩斯州南部的私人發射場 Starbase 的一大優點是，公眾可以接近火箭幾百英尺的範圍。周圍的泥灘、沙丘、海灘都是公共土地。

At government launch sites, such as Cape Canaveral, Florida, public access is generally restricted to guided tours. Even then, the closest most people can get to an active launch pad is about a mile, and much farther than that on launch days.

在佛羅裡達州卡納維爾角等政府發射場，公眾進入通常僅限於導遊。即便如此，大多數人距離發射台最近的距離大約是一英里，比發射日遠得多。

SpaceX delayed the Starship test flight from Friday to replace actuators on grid fins positioned near the top of the rocket's first stage. Ground teams removed the upper stage from the rocket Thursday to complete the repairs, then reinstalled the upper stage Friday morning to continue with launch preparations.

SpaceX 從週五推遲了 Starship 試飛，以取代位於火箭第一級頂部附近的網格鰭上的執行器。週四，地面團隊從火箭上拆除了上級以完成維修，然後週五早上重新安裝了上級，繼續進行發射準備。

The test flight on tap Saturday, if fully successful, will put SpaceX on a path toward additional demonstrations, and perhaps the first operational Starship flights to carry Starlink Internet satellites into orbit. Eventually, SpaceX wants Starship to be the next-generation vehicle to replace and expand the capacity offered by the company's existing Falcon 9 rocket and Dragon spacecraft.

週六的試飛如果完全成功，將使 SpaceX 走上更多演示的道路，或許也是首次將星鍊互聯網衛星送入軌道的星際飛船飛行。最終，SpaceX 希望 Starship 成為下一代運載工具，以取代和擴大該公司現有的 Falcon 9 火箭和 Dragon 飛船所提供的運載能力。

On Saturday, SpaceX's launch team will begin loading propellants into the Super Heavy booster and Starship upper stage a little more than 90 minutes before liftoff time. Thermal conditioning of the rocket's Raptor engines will start around 20 minutes prior to launch. In the final 10 seconds of the countdown, several hundred thousand gallons of water will flow through a deluge system to dampen the energy from the nearly simultaneous ignition of 33 Raptor engines at the bottom of the rocket.

週六，SpaceX 的發射團隊將在升空前 90 分鐘多一點開始將推進劑裝入超重型助推器和星際飛船上級。火箭猛禽引擎的熱調節將在發射前 20 分鐘左右開始。在倒數計時的最後 10 秒內，數十萬加侖的水將流經雨淋系統，以抑制火箭底部 33 個猛禽引擎幾乎同時點火所產生的能量。

If you're a space enthusiast, that's when the real fun begins. Here are five things to watch for on SpaceX's second full-scale Starship test flight.

如果您是太空愛好者，那麼真正的樂趣才開始。以下是 SpaceX 第二次全尺寸星艦試飛中值得關注的五件事。

1. How will the launch pad hold up?

When the first Starship rocket launched April 20, it made a big mess. The blast from the Super Heavy booster's Raptor engines blew a hole in the concrete beneath the pedestal the rocket sits before launch. Massive chunks of concrete were strewn across hundreds of acres around the launch pad, denting tanks and carving craters in the surrounding mud flats. Clouds of dust and sand fell on communities several miles away.

1. 發射台將如何支撐？4 月 20 日第一枚 Starship 火箭發射時，弄得一團糟。超重型助推器猛禽引擎的爆炸在火箭發射前所在的基座下方的混凝土上炸出了一個洞。發射台周圍數百英畝的土地上散落著大量混凝土塊，使儲槽凹陷，並在周圍的泥灘上留下了彈坑。塵沙雲落在幾英里外的社區。

This is something SpaceX doesn't want to repeat with the second test flight, so engineers installed a water deluge system at the pad to protect it from similar damage again. In the final seconds of the countdown, the deluge system will release up to 358,000 gallons of fresh water through channels built into a steel plate installed underneath the pad's circular launch mount. The fountain-like flow of water is supposed to absorb the heat and acoustic energy from the Super Heavy engines.

SpaceX 不想在第二次試飛中重複這種情況，因此工程師在發射台上安裝了水淋系統，以保護其再次免受類似損壞。在倒數計時的最後幾秒，雨淋系統將透過安裝在發射台圓形發射底座下方的鋼板中內建的通道釋放多達 358,000 加侖的淡水。噴泉般的水流應該吸收超重型引擎的熱量和聲能。

Other launch pads, including SpaceX's own launch facilities for the Falcon 9 rocket, use similar water deluge systems.

其他發射台，包括 SpaceX 自己的獵鷹 9 號火箭發射設施，都使用類似的水淋系統。

SpaceX tested the water deluge system several times since April, including on a pair of hold-down engine tests with the Super Heavy booster in August. The launch pad held up fine during those hot-fire tests, and we'll soon know if the deluge system does the job during a real launch.

自 4 月以來，SpaceX 多次測試了水淋系統，其中包括 8 月使用超重型助推器進行的兩次壓緊引擎測試。在這些熱火測試中，發射台表現良好，我們很快就會知道雨淋系統在真正的發射過程中是否能發揮作用。

2. Will the Raptor engines do better this time?

At least five of the 33 Raptor engines failed on the Super Heavy booster when it flew for the first time in April. SpaceX will try to improve on that with the second test flight of the Super Heavy-Starship rocket.

2. 這次猛禽引擎會做得更好嗎？超重型助推器4月份首飛時，33個猛禽引擎中至少有5個出現故障。 SpaceX 將嘗試透過超重型星艦火箭的第二次試飛來改進這一點。

These engines each generate a half-million pounds of thrust, for a total of nearly 17 million pounds of thrust while the Super Heavy booster powers the rocket for the first two-and-a-half minutes of the flight. This is more than twice the thrust of the Saturn V rocket used for the Apollo Moon missions. SpaceX can afford to lose a handful of engines without any catastrophic effects on the test flight, but it would be nice if the rocket lost none.

這些引擎各自產生 50 萬磅的推力，總計近 1700 萬磅的推力，而超重型助推器則在飛行的前兩分半鐘為火箭提供動力。這是用於阿波羅登月任務的土星五號火箭推力的兩倍多。 SpaceX 可以承受失去少量引擎的損失，而不會對試飛造成任何災難性影響，但如果火箭沒有損失任何引擎那就太好了。

In April, propellant leaks and fires in the booster's engine compartment severed connection with the rocket's primary flight computer, and the vehicle lost control a little more than two minutes into the flight. Shortly thereafter, a self-destruct mechanism activated to blow up the rocket.

4 月份，助推器發動機艙發生推進劑洩漏和起火，導致與火箭主飛行電腦的連接中斷，飛行器在飛行兩分鐘多一點後失去控制。此後不久，自毀裝置啟動，炸毀了火箭。

For the second test flight, SpaceX technicians tightened bolts in fuel manifold connections on the Raptor engines to reduce the risk of leaks. They've also beefed up shielding between the engines to protect adjacent Raptors from an explosion on a neighboring engine. On future launches, Raptor engines will have redesigned fuel manifolds to fully address the part that is prone to leaks.

在第二次試飛中，SpaceX 技術人員擰緊了猛禽引擎燃料歧管連接處的螺栓，以降低洩漏風險。他們還加強了引擎之間的防護，以保護相鄰的猛禽免受相鄰引擎爆炸的影響。在未來的發布中，猛禽引擎將重新設計燃油歧管，以完全解決容易洩漏的部分。

"We do anticipate the Raptor engines will perform better for this test," said Lisa Watson-Morgan, manager of NASA's Human Landing System program, which oversees a SpaceX contract to develop a human-rated lunar lander based on the Starship design. "By the time of the Human Landing System Starship, we will be on a much later generation of Raptor, thereby having the predictability of the engines that is required for human-rating of the Starship itself."

NASA 載人著陸系統項目經理麗莎·沃森-摩根(Lisa Watson-Morgan) 表示：「我們確實預計猛禽發動機將在這次測試中表現更好。」該項目負責監督SpaceX 的一份合同，該合約旨在開發基於星艦設計的載人月球著陸器。 “到人類登陸系統星際飛船的時候，我們將使用更新一代的猛禽，從而擁有對星際飛船本身進行人類評級所需的發動機的可預測性。”

The Super Heavy booster's steering system also has an upgrade debuting on the second test flight. This is a switch from a hydraulic thrust vector control mechanism to an electric one to gimbal, or pivot, thrust from the cluster of 13 Raptor engines at the center of the Super Heavy booster. The outer ring of 20 engines do not gimbal.

超重型助推器的轉向系統也進行了升級，並在第二次試飛中首次亮相。這是從液壓推力向量控制機構到電動推力向量控制機構的切換，以透過位於超重型助推器中心的 13 個猛禽引擎組提供萬向節或樞軸推力。 20引擎外環沒有萬向節。

3. How will hot staging work?

Then, at 2 minutes and 41 seconds into the flight, there's another big moment. This is when the Super Heavy booster will switch off its engines and release from the Starship upper stage to climbing into space.

3. 熱升遷將如何進行？然後，在飛行 2 分 41 秒時，又一個重要時刻到來。此時，超重型助推器將關閉引擎並從星艦上層釋放並爬入太空。

The rocket flown on the April 20 test flight didn't make it this far before tumbling out of control. Assuming the rocket is still flying steady at this point, the Super Heavy booster will shut down most of its engines to start the stage separation sequence, followed by the physical disconnection of the stages at the exact moment the Raptor engines ignite on the upper stage. This "hot staging" technique, though novel for SpaceX, has been used on a number of Russian rockets for decades.

4月20日試飛的火箭沒有飛這麼遠就失控了。假設此時火箭仍穩定飛行，超重型助推器將關閉其大部分發動機以啟動級分離序列，然後在上級猛禽發動機點火的同時，級間物理斷開。這種「熱分級」技術雖然對 SpaceX 來說很新穎，但幾十年來已在許多俄羅斯火箭上使用。

Typically, rockets switch off their booster engines for a few seconds before jettisoning the first stage, and then lighting the upper stage a moment later. The upshot of the change is it increases the Starship’s payload lift capability, which already amounted to more than 100 metric tons to low Earth orbit. But it means engineers had to add shielding to the top of the stainless steel booster, which SpaceX wants to recover and reuse numerous times.

通常情況下，火箭會在放棄第一級之前關閉助推引擎幾秒鐘，然後稍後點燃上級。這一變化的結果是增加了星艦的有效載荷升力能力，該能力已達到近地軌道超過 100 噸。但這意味著工程師必須在不銹鋼助推器的頂部添加屏蔽層，SpaceX 希望多次回收和重複使用該不銹鋼助推器。

One of the design changes required to implement hot staging is a new 6-foot extension to the top of the Super Heavy booster with vents to allow super-hot gas from the upper stage engines to safely flow out of the rocket’s structure “and not just blow itself up,” Musk said earlier this year. “This is the most risky thing, I think, for the next flight.”

實施熱升級所需的設計變更之一是在超重型助推器頂部增加一個新的6 英尺延伸部分，並帶有通風口，以允許來自上級發動機的超熱氣體安全地流出火箭的結構，“而不僅僅是爆炸自己，」馬斯克今年稍早說道。 “我認為，對於下一次飛行來說，這是最危險的事情。”

"I think the probability of this next flight working, getting to orbit, is much higher than the last one," Musk continued. "Maybe it's like 60 percent. It depends on how well we do at stage separation.”

「我認為下一次飛行成功進入軌道的可能性比上一次要高得多，」馬斯克繼續說道。 “也許是 60%。這取決於我們在階段分離方面做得如何。”

4. Can Starship fly in space?

SpaceX tested five Starship prototypes in 2020 and 2021 on high-altitude flights within the atmosphere, for the purpose of wringing out the company's concept on how to land the vehicle. These tests all ended in explosions until the last one on May 5, 2021, when a full-scale Starship upper stage safely landed after flying to an altitude of around 33,000 feet (10 kilometers).

4. Starship 能在太空中飛行嗎？SpaceX 在 2020 年和 2021 年在大氣層內的高空飛行中測試了 5 個 Starship 原型機，目的是敲定公司如何著陸的概念。這些測試都以爆炸告終，直到 2021 年 5 月 5 日最後一次測試，當時一艘全尺寸星艦上級在飛到約 33,000 英尺（10 公里）的高度後安全著陸。

These were dramatic events. SpaceX showed the Starship could descend back to Earth with a "belly flop" maneuver, then safely flip from horizontal to vertical orientation just before reaching the ground for a propulsive landing.

這些都是戲劇性的事件。 SpaceX 展示了星艦可以透過「腹部翻轉」動作下降返回地球，然後在到達地面進行推進著陸之前安全地從水平翻轉到垂直方向。

What those flights didn't do was test Starship in space. That could happen Saturday, assuming good performance from the Super Heavy booster. Starship's upper stage has six Raptor engines, three steerable engines in the center and three Raptors with larger fixed nozzles around the perimeter of the rocket. The three engines with larger nozzles are optimized for operation in the airless vacuum of space.

這些飛行沒有做的是在太空中測試星艦。假設超重型助推器表現良好，這可能會在周六發生。星艦的上級有六個猛禽發動機，中間有三個可操縱的發動機，火箭週邊有三個帶有較大固定噴嘴的猛禽發動機。具有較大噴嘴的三台引擎針對在真空無氣的太空中運行進行了最佳化。

These six Raptor engines will produce nearly twice the thrust of the booster stage of SpaceX's workhorse Falcon 9 rocket. That's a lot of oomph for an upper stage. The flight profile for SpaceX's second full-scale Starship test flight, designated OFT-2 or IFT-2, calls for the six upper stage Raptor engines to burn for around six minutes, until shutting off at 8 minutes and 33 seconds into the mission, accelerating the rocket nearly to orbital velocity.

這六台猛禽引擎將產生近兩倍於 SpaceX 主力獵鷹 9 號火箭助推級推力的推力。這對於上層舞台來說是很大的魅力。 SpaceX 第二次全尺寸星艦試飛（指定為 OFT-2 或 IFT-2）的飛行剖面要求六個上級猛禽發動機燃燒約六分鐘，直到任務進行到 8 分 33 秒時關閉。將火箭加速到接近軌道速度。

But SpaceX has never tried to ignite Raptor engines in a space-like environment. The air pressure here is a tiny fraction of what it is at sea level. Several rockets have failed at ignition of their upper stages this year, including the inaugural flights of Japan's new H3 rocket and Relativity Space's Terran 1 rocket. Will Starship continue the trend?

但SpaceX從未嘗試過在類似太空的環境中點燃猛禽引擎。這裡的氣壓只是海平面氣壓的一小部分。今年有幾枚火箭的上級點火失敗，包括日本新型 H3 火箭和 Relativity Space 的 Terran 1 火箭的首次飛行。 Starship會延續這趨勢嗎？

5. Will the booster and ship make it back to Earth?

If everything goes perfectly, or close to it, Starship will coast through space for a little more than an hour. After initially heading east from South Texas over the Gulf of Mexico, Starship will fly over the Straits of Florida just north of Cuba, then over the Atlantic Ocean, Africa, and the Indian Ocean. SpaceX is intentionally not giving the rocket enough velocity to maintain a stable orbit, so Starship will reenter the atmosphere over the Pacific Ocean and target a predawn splashdown northwest of Hawaii.

5. 助推器和飛船能否返回地球？如果一切順利或接近順利，星際飛船將在太空中滑行一個多小時。星艦最初從德州南部向東飛越墨西哥灣後，將飛越古巴北部的佛羅裡達海峽，然後飛越大西洋、非洲和印度洋。 SpaceX 故意不讓火箭有足夠的速度來維持穩定的軌道，因此 Starship 將重新進入太平洋上空的大氣層，並瞄準黎明前在夏威夷西北部濺落。

One side of the stainless steel Starship upper stage is covered with ceramic tiles to shield the rocket from the heat of reentry. There are fins on Starship to help guide it through the atmosphere before finally reaching the surface of the Pacific about 90 minutes after launching from Texas.

不銹鋼星艦上級的一側覆蓋著瓷磚，以保護火箭免受再入時的熱量影響。星艦上有鰭片，可以幫助引導它穿過大氣層，然後從德克薩斯州發射大約 90 分鐘後最終到達太平洋表面。

The Super Heavy booster will also attempt a controlled splashdown in the sea after falling away from the Starship upper stage. Its target will be a controlled water landing in the Gulf of Mexico around 20 miles (32 kilometers) off the Texas coast, using thrust from a subset of its Raptor engines to brake for splashdown.

超重型助推器在脫離星艦上層後還將嘗試在海上受控濺落。其目標是在距離德克薩斯州海岸約 20 英里（32 公里）的墨西哥灣進行受控水上著陸，利用猛禽發動機子集的推力進行煞車以防止濺落。

These recovery experiments are akin to SpaceX's tests of the recovery system on the Falcon 9 booster in the mid-2010s. Those tests ended in a series of crash landings before the company successfully landed a Falcon 9 booster of the first time in 2015, five years after the first Falcon 9 launch.

這些回收實驗類似於 SpaceX 在 2010 年代中期對獵鷹 9 號助推器上的回收系統進行的測試。這些測試以一系列緊急降落結束，之後該公司於 2015 年（即獵鷹 9 號首次發射五年後）首次成功降落了獵鷹 9 號助推器。

SpaceX eventually wants to land the Super Heavy booster and Starship vehicle back at their launch pad for inspections, refueling, and rapid reuse. For the rocket's experimental test flights, water landings will do.

SpaceX 最終希望將超重型助推器和星際飛船運回發射台進行檢查、加油和快速重複使用。對於火箭的實驗性測試飛行，水上著陸就可以了。