SpaceX Announced Starship Landing on the Droneship after Orbital Plan Shocked the Whole Industry…

Ladies and gentlemen, a very warm welcome to all of you. Please join me in a massive celebration as we officially welcome Starship's very first landing drone ship after what feels like an eternity of anticipation. For those of you who have been following the SpaceX journey for a long time, the name we're about to discuss is going to sound incredibly familiar. Like an old friend returning for a new adventure. We're going to dive deep into exactly what this system is and what it means for the future of multi-planetary life. Later on, we'll be shifting our gaze further away from Earth to discuss a record that many people might have missed. It's a record involving the Artemis II mission and the staggering, almost mind-bending distance between two different groups of human beings in space. It's a story of how spread our civilization is becoming, and it's absolutely fascinating. Let's find out all about these exciting updates on today's episode of Great SpaceX. SpaceX kicked off Tuesday, April 21st with a Falcon 9 launch that went as smoothly as a weekly bus route, provided your bus involves fire and breaking the sound barrier. They delivered the GPS 3-8 satellite for the Space Force, ensuring the military never has an excuse for getting lost on the way to a taco stand again. It was a perfectly routine day of orbital domination until the booster landed on the Just Read The Instructions drone ship. That is when SpaceX dropped a bombshell announcement that made the entire aerospace community do a collective double-take and rethink the future of Starship. It all began with the successful landing of the mission's first stage booster. As the rocket came screaming back through the atmosphere, it aimed itself perfectly at the drone ship waiting out in the Atlantic. That ship, of course, was Just Read The Instructions, often referred to by its initials JRTI. Seeing a booster stick the landing on a floating platform is always a thrill, but the message SpaceX released immediately after the landing changed everything. They announced that this was the very last planned Falcon mission for this specific drone ship. They followed that up with a confirmation that sent shockwaves through social media. After an incredible 156 successful Falcon 9 landings, Just Read The Instructions is officially being reassigned. Its new job? To be fully dedicated to supporting Starship operations from this point forward. Think about it, 156 times this floating rectangle sat in a grumpy ocean while a skyscraper-sized rocket fell from the sky and stuck the landing better than most people park their cars. It's a legendary run that proves Falcon 9 is basically the reliable minivan of space. But now, Just Read The Instructions is getting a massive promotion to support the beautiful chaos of Starship. While everyone is hyped about the Mechazilla arms, those giant robotic chopsticks that look like they belong in a giant's kitchen, SpaceX knows it pays to have options. By mixing high-tech tower catches with trusty drone ship landings, they get the kind of flexibility that makes other space agencies weep. It gives mission directors the choice between a robotic hug or a floating target, ensuring that no matter how spicy the mission gets, there's always a place to park. This move is particularly interesting because it comes right on the heels of some stiff competition. Blue Origin recently managed to successfully land their own new Glenn booster on a drone ship for the second time in a row. It seems SpaceX is not interested in letting anyone else claim the title of king of the drone ships. And by moving a legendary ship like JRTI over the Starship program, they are asserting their leadership in a very big way. What surprised a lot of people, though, was that SpaceX didn't just build a brand new ship from scratch for Starship. Instead, they're taking a proven veteran from the Falcon program and giving it a massive promotion. This immediately led fans to wonder if losing a drone ship would hurt the Falcon 9's busy schedule. Thankfully, we got an answer from the very top. Kiko Donchev, the VP of launch at SpaceX, took to the internet to explain the strategy. He used a really great analogy comparing launchpads and drone ships to airplane runways. He explained that just like a busy airport, you generally need a landing runway for every takeoff runway. Ideally, you want the rocket to land right back where it started, which is exactly what Starship is designed to do. He noted that with Launchpad 39A becoming primarily focused on Falcon Heavy and Starship, SpaceX actually does not need two separate drone ships on the East Coast to keep up with their Falcon schedule. They can manage just fine with one. He pointed out that their other East Coast drone ship, a shortfall of Gravitas, can support a four-day launch cycle all by itself when paired with ground landings. This is how they've been running things on the West Coast for quite some time, so they know how the system works. Kiko also gave us a bit of a teaser by saying that just read the instructions, we'll be Together, they will support the transport of Starship and Super Heavy components between the testing grounds in Texas and the launch sites at Cape Canaveral. It turns out this is all part of a very clever master plan to restructure how SpaceX uses its various launchpads. They currently have three main paths for Falcon rockets, 39A and 40 in Florida and 4E in California. For years, NASA was a bit worried that building a massive Starship tower right next to the Falcon pad at 39A might put the Falcon missions at risk. Falcon is, after all, the only way American astronauts currently get to the space station, but SpaceX has figured out a way to make the transition smooth. The plan is for launchpad 39A to focus on the heavy hitters, Falcon Heavy and the future of Starship. Meanwhile, the standard Falcon 9 operations, including the critical crewed missions for NASA, are shifting over to pad 40. This pad has been upgraded with its own crew access arm and emergency escape system, making it a fully capable home for the Crew Dragon capsule. Since Crew 12 launched earlier this year in February, we've already seen this shift in action. By moving these standard Falcon 9 missions to their own dedicated pad, SpaceX can push the rocket to its maximum capacity without worrying about Starship construction getting in the way. It keeps NASA happy because their missions to the space station have a clear path and it keeps SpaceX happy because they can build their giant moon rocket as fast as they want. Now back to our favorite droneship. Since pad 40 will be the primary spot for Falcon 9 on the east coast, having two droneships there became a bit of a luxury SpaceX didn't need. A shortfall of Gravitas, or ASOG, will handle the heavy lifting for Falcon landings from now on. If there's ever a situation where a ship is not back in port in time for the next launch, SpaceX can just land the boosters back on land at their dedicated landing zones. This setup is perfectly balanced for the current manifest. But before JRTI can start catching Starships, it's going to need some serious work done. It's currently at the beginning of a transformation process because Starship is a completely different beast than the Falcon 9. The first thing they need to fix is the durability. To put it simply, Starship is a monster. When a Falcon 9 lands, it's pushing down with about 60 tons of thrust from a single engine. That's a lot, but Starship is on a whole different level. If a Starship or its super-heavy booster tries to land just using three of its inner engines, it could be putting out over 800 tons of thrust. Even if they throttle the engines down for a gentle touchdown, we're talking about 10 times more power hitting the deck of the ship compared to a Falcon booster. Then you have to consider the weight. An empty Falcon booster weighs about 25 tons. An empty Starship weighs 100 tons. And the super-heavy booster weighs twice that. JRTI is going to need to be reinforced with extra steel, more power, and better stability systems so it doesn't wobble or buckle when that massive stainless steel tower comes home to roost. However, the trillion dollar question, how do you land a giant stainless steel skyscraper on a boat when it literally doesn't have any legs? As of right now, Starship does not have landing legs. It's designed to be caught by the arms on the launch tower. So if it's going to land on a ship in the ocean, SpaceX has to decide on a solution. They might build a giant support structure or a hole in the middle of the ship for the rocket to sit in. Or they could go full sci-fi and build a mini version of the Mechazilla tower right on the deck of the drone ship. Another option is that they might actually add landing legs to certain versions of Starship. They'll eventually need legs for missions to the moon and Mars anyway, so testing them out on a drone ship makes a lot of sense. However, adding legs is not easy. It changes the weight, the balance, and the plumbing of the entire rocket. It's a huge engineering challenge, but if anyone can solve it, it's the team that successfully landed a rocket on a ship in the first place. Whatever modifications we see appearing on JRTI in the coming months will give us a huge hint about how SpaceX plans to conquer the moon. Speaking of the moon, let's shift gears and talk about the incredible journey of Artemis 2. We've seen some stunning photos and videos from this mission over the last 10 days, and it's already broken several records. The one everyone knows about is that this crew has traveled further from Earth than any humans in history, beating the old Apollo records. But there's a second record that is just as important, even if it has not been talked about as much. It's the record for the greatest distance ever recorded between two different groups of people in space. This happened back on April 6th, and it was officially tracked by astrophysicist Jonathan McDowell. At first, McDowell thought the record was set between the four astronauts on the Artemis 2 and the crew living on the ISS. But after he did the math and looked at the position of the Chinese Tiangong space station, he realized the gap was even bigger. At one point, the Artemis 2 crew was over 260,000 miles away from the Chinese Taikonauts orbiting the Earth. To put that in perspective, that is a distance of over 419,000 kilometers. If you were one of those astronauts looking back at the Earth, knowing that the only other humans not on the planet were that far away, you might feel a little bit lonely. Or maybe you would feel incredibly proud of how far we've come. This record is a massive deal, because it proves humanity is finally getting some serious elbow room. During the Apollo missions, you were either tucked in at home or on a very lonely trip to the moon with zero neighbors in sight. Today, with permanent residents on the ISS and the Tiangong station, we have stopped asking how far we can run away from Earth and started measuring how far we can spread our civilization before the Wi-Fi cuts out. At the peak of this record, the distance was calculated to be about 419,656 kilometers. We are moving toward a future where we measure the gap between humans from Mercury to the moons of Saturn. Eventually kilometers will be too small to bother with, and we'll be talking in astronomical units or light years. It's a slow, glitchy process, filled with hardware headaches and the occasional cosmic wardrobe malfunction. But every droneship move is another brick in our multi-planet, multi-planet foundation. We are moving out, we are taking our stuff, and this time, we're staying for good. When will it finally reach orbit? That is the gargantuan question currently looming over Starship. The vehicle that Elon Musk has always proudly described as the largest flying object ever constructed by human hands. After months of intense anticipation, nail-biting delays, and a fair share of spectacular fireballs, it feels as though we are finally standing on the precipice of that historic moment. So when exactly will it happen, and how is the team at SpaceX preparing to turn this ambitious dream into an orbital reality? Starship is currently in its V3 iteration, a phase that marks a significant leap in technological advancement for the platform. More importantly, we have officially moved into 2026, which is a critical year of preparation before the high-stakes races for crewed lunar landings truly begin. One of the overarching goals for this calendar year is to finally get a Starship into a stable orbit. It's a bit of a sobering thought to remember that across its 11 experimental flights so far, Starship has technically never achieved orbit. Even the upcoming Flight 12, despite its massive upgrades, might still stick to a high-altitude suborbital trajectory to test its thermal protection systems. But the real change is visible on the horizon. Recent FCC permits have pulled back the curtain on SpaceX's near-term roadmap. The agency recently revised the permit for Flight 12 and, more interestingly, published the initial permit for Flight 13. Within the explanation section of the Flight 13 documentation, there is a massive shift in strategy. It's no longer described as a suborbital flight for both stages. Instead, the permit indicates that while the first-stage booster will remain suborbital, the second-stage ship is slated to finally reach orbit. This would be the second official flight of the V3 hardware following immediately on the heels of Flight 12. To understand why this is such a massive deal, we have to look at the standard of the space industry. In the world of aerospace engineering, reaching orbit is the ultimate litmus test. You can have the shiniest rocket, the coolest mission patches, and the most followers on social media, but none of it truly matters until you can maintain a stable orbit around the Earth. Once a vehicle reaches this standard, it has officially entered the space race. We can look at Blue Origin to see exactly how heavy that orbital pressure can be. Despite being a massive company with world-class talent, they were heavily ridiculed for years because they hadn't yet put a payload into orbit. Reaching that gateway changes the entire narrative of the program. Furthermore, reaching orbit unlocks the full potential of the Starship architecture. The vehicle is designed to go far beyond our backyard, targeting distant worlds like Mars and the Asteroid Belt. To do that, it first has to master Earth orbit, where it will eventually support the construction of massive satellite constellations like Starlink and Kuiper, aka Amazon Leo. It also needs to perform specialized orbital tasks such as cryogenic refueling, which is basically a high-speed gas station in space, which is like having a high-speed gas station in space, and the complex maneuvers required to fly back to Starbase for a pinpoint landing. All of these advanced goals are locked behind the orbital door. If SpaceX pulls this off, the payload capacity of the new Starship could be fully realized, allowing it to carry hundreds of tons in a single go. We're talking about the potential for complete reusability on a scale never before seen in the industry. Reaching orbit at this specific junction is also about keeping pace with the competition. Rivals like NASA's SLS, Yolei's Vulcan, and Blue Origin's New Glenn have all successfully reached orbit despite their own share of developmental hurdles. Even on the other side of the globe, China's Jiuquan, a methallox rocket that shares some striking similarities with Starship's design philosophy, has already achieved orbital status. Starship needs to prove its leadership potential sooner rather than later to remain the king of the mountain. So when can we expect this historic Flight 13 to take off? According to the FCC license, the official operation date is set for May 29th of 2026. Now if you have followed SpaceX for more than 5 minutes, you know that they rarely launch on the very first day a permit allows. In the world of Elon time, a May 29th start date usually translates to a launch window opening in June. We should probably expect a few traditional countdown aborts or weather delays just to keep our heart rates up. One interesting detail in the permit involves the landing procedure. In the purpose of operation section, the FCC notes that both the booster and the ship will either return to the launch site or perform a water landing. This leaves the door open for a potential landing at Starbase, likely for the booster, which we have all been dying to see. However, given that Flight 13 is a first time orbital attempt for the ship, it's very likely that SpaceX will opt for a safe ocean splashdown for both stages. This allows the vehicle to use every drop of its propellant to push the orbital boundaries as far as possible without worrying about the fuel reserves needed for a precision return to the launch pad. It simplifies a very complex mission, ensuring the primary goal, which is orbit, is achieved without unnecessary risks. Of course, to get to Flight 13, SpaceX first has to survive Flight 12, which is currently targeted for May. The primary mission of Flight 12 is to stress test the new V3 upgrades and ensure that the platform is stable enough for more ambitious goals. This demand for perfection is likely why we have seen so many delays lately. Originally, this flight was pegged for January, but the failure of B18 sent everyone back to the drawing board. Since then, the preparations have been methodical and, frankly, a bit slow. Each check and recheck takes weeks. While this creates immense time pressure for the rest of 2026, SpaceX seems to believe that a slow, successful mission is better than a fast, failed one. If they launch in May, they only have seven months left in the year to tackle orbital landings, payload deployments, and refueling tests. It's a packed schedule, to say the least, but the hardware for Flight 13 is already looking promising. Ship 40 has been stacked for quite a while and is sporting a full complement of heat shield tiles. B20 is also nearing completion with its final sections, including the hot staging ring and the forward section finally making an appearance. It looks like the hardware is ready to roll the moment Flight 12 clears the pad. Speaking of the pad, the launch system at Starbase is also undergoing a bit of a makeover. Since this will be the first attempt at a launch from the new pad too, SpaceX is being extra cautious. We recently saw the team attaching giant orange water bags to the launch tower arms or the chopsticks. For those who aren't familiar with heavy construction, these bags are used to test the load-bearing capacity and durability of the arms. It's basically like giving the launch tower a heavy-duty workout at the gym to make sure it can handle the weight of a fully-fueled Starship without breaking a sweat. Looking even further ahead, SpaceX has to plan the orbital route for Starship. Once it reaches orbit, the traditional landing zone in the Indian Ocean might become a thing of the past. Instead, the team might target the Pacific Ocean, which actually brings the ship much closer to the Texas coast. If they can stick a landing in the Pacific on Flight 13, it opens the door for a landing off the coast of Texas for Flight 14 and potentially a full-blown catch at Starbase by Flight 15. However, changing flight pads involves a mountain of international licensing and diplomacy, as the route would likely pass over parts of Southeast Asia or Oceania. It's a logistical headache that only a company like SpaceX would willingly take on. Thanks for tuning in to Great SpaceX, I'm Kevin and we truly appreciate your support as we track these historic missions. If you enjoyed this update, please like, subscribe and turn on notifications so you never miss a beat. Until next time, keep your eyes on the horizon and keep looking up!