Making lifemulti­planetary

Flight profile: a representative Starship mission

1. Your scroll is the throttle. Super Heavy and Starship stand 124 metres tall, loaded with liquid methane and liquid oxygen chilled below their boiling points. Scroll to light 33 engines.
2. Liftoff. 33 Raptor engines light in sequence and the most powerful rocket ever flown climbs off the pad.
3. Max-Q. Peak aerodynamic pressure. The stack pushes through the densest air it will meet on the way up.
4. Main engine cutoff. All but three of the booster's engines shut down, around two and a half minutes into flight.
5. Hot staging. Starship lights its six engines while still attached and pushes away on its own fire. A vented ring between the stages takes the blast.
6. Boostback. Super Heavy flips around and relights its engines to fly back toward the launch site.
7. Booster catch. Minutes later, the tower's arms close around the returning booster, ready to be refuelled and flown again.
8. Engine cutoff. Starship shuts down and coasts above the atmosphere at close to orbital velocity.
9. Next: everywhere. Orbit, refilling in space, the Moon and Mars. The same ship, built to fly again.