SpaceX is pressing toward two Starship missions that would close out its 2026 launch campaign, with Flight 15 targeted for November and Flight 16 aimed at December, according to the latest schedule update. The November mission is intended to attempt the first catch of both the Super Heavy booster and the Ship, a milestone that would open the door to reflights of recovered vehicles.
The current no-earlier-than date for Flight 15 is November 8, though meeting that timeline depends on both the booster and the Ship completing static fire tests before launch. Ship 42 was nearing its trip to the test site for that milestone when its engines were removed, and the vehicle instead made a short additional trip for a cryogenic proof test. Booster 22 is believed to have all of its engines installed and is awaiting transport to Pad 2 for its own pre-launch static fire, a move that could occur within days and would first be signaled by road closure notices.
The engine removal on Ship 42 may be connected to a Raptor Vacuum shutdown observed during Flight 14. Elon Musk recently described the issue as a software failure isolated to the engine computer on that specific unit, saying the problem did not appear on any of the other engines and calling it a glitch that is not a major concern and should be straightforward to resolve. Because the sea-level Raptors did not show the same software problem, SpaceX remained confident those engines would perform as expected and proceeded with the orbital attempt, pointing away from a broader hardware issue.
Musk has said the volume of changes between flights can range from hundreds to thousands, consistent with figures previously cited by the company. He indicated that the current campaign involves fewer modifications than some earlier ones, although certain updates still require substantial work. Those changes may help explain the engine removals, as modifications inside Ship 42 could have required an additional cryogenic proof test, which in turn meant pulling the engines. SpaceX may also have wanted to validate software updates on the engines at its McGregor facility, although no such testing has been publicly observed there yet.
Musk has said Flight 15 is targeted for launch within the next four to six weeks, before Thanksgiving, aligning with an early-to-mid November window. He confirmed that SpaceX intends to attempt catches of both the Super Heavy booster and the Ship. A successful dual catch would mark the first full recovery attempt of a Starship vehicle and open the door to subsequent milestones, including the first reflights of a properly recovered Ship.
Current activity points to Booster 23 and Ship 43 as the likely vehicles for Flight 16. Ship 43 is inside Mega Bay 2 and was seen welcoming Ship 40 back to Starbase after its return from an ocean landing. Booster 23 has already begun pre-launch testing with a trip to Massey's for cryoproofing, which concluded over the weekend with a Sunday morning trip back to Mega Bay 1 for engine installation.
Although Musk suggested that the next flight could involve the vehicles caught on Flight 15, Flight 16 is more likely to proceed without waiting for the full series of post-catch checks on those vehicles. That is particularly relevant if the mission is intended to serve as the first Starship launch from the East Coast. Source information currently links Flight 16 to the goal of bringing Launch Complex 39A online before the end of the year, and the December target is consistent with that objective, though plans remain subject to change depending on the outcome of Flight 15 and SpaceX's operational priorities.
Both vehicles would need to be shipped individually to Kennedy Space Center aboard the transport barge You'll Thank Me Later, which is now in full operation and most recently delivered a Ship transport stand and the Starlink loader from Starbase to KSC. The transport would see both vehicles arrive individually up the Banana River into the KSC turn basin, following the same route previously used by Space Shuttle External Tanks and SLS Core Stages aboard NASA's barge Pegasus. Once offloaded, they would be rolled to SpaceX's Roberts Road facility, where the new Gigabay is expected to have two bays available for checks before the vehicles are moved to 39A for testing. At the pad, the booster would undergo a series of propellant loading tests to confirm that 39A's Starship infrastructure is ready to support its first launch, culminating in a static fire.
The resulting cadence would produce only five Starship launches in 2026, a figure highly related to the transition between Block 2 and Block 3 vehicles, as SpaceX continues to project hundreds of launches per year from Starbase alone in the longer term.