Starship Flight 15: Booster Diverted to the Gulf, Ship Coasts in Orbit Ahead of Saturday's Tower Catch Attempt
SpaceX skipped the planned booster catch on Friday evening and sent the rocket into the Gulf of Mexico, while the ship released 26 Starlink V3 satellites and waits for its own return.
Outspoken Digest Technology Desk
Saturday, November 14, 2026/2 min read
Starship did reach orbit on Friday evening, but the first attempt to catch a Version 3 Super Heavy booster did not happen. SpaceX called off the tower catch and steered the booster to a splashdown in the Gulf of Mexico, while the upper stage went on to release 26 Starlink V3 satellites and settle into a long coast.
This desk reported on Friday morning that the flight had no launch licence yet. It flew anyway, from Starbase in South Texas, and the flight is still in progress as this is written, so what follows is where it stands and not a verdict.
What happened to the Super Heavy booster on Flight 15?
Starship lifted off on Friday for its 15th test flight, and Interesting Engineering reported that the booster was not caught by the launch tower's mechanical arms as planned. SpaceX said on X that the booster "has diverted to an offshore splashdown in the Gulf." SpaceX's Dan Huot told viewers that 32 of the booster's 33 engines had remained operational during the flight.
SpaceX had not said why it abandoned the catch when that report was published. StockTitan's account notes that the company had described the attempt as the first return and catch of a V3 booster, which carries Raptor 3 engines. Until SpaceX publishes an explanation, the cause remains unconfirmed.
Did the Starship upper stage reach orbit?
It did. According to StockTitan, the ship made its orbital insertion burn at about 6:15 p.m. Eastern, reaching an orbit of roughly 275 km, then began deploying 26 Starlink V3 satellites at 6:27 p.m. SpaceX said all of them were in orbit by 7:06 p.m., and at 7:08 p.m. the ship had begun a long coast with systems looking good. The same account says each V3 satellite adds about one terabit of capacity, which SpaceX equates to roughly ten Falcon 9 launches of the older V2 Mini design.
Liftoff came at 4:47 p.m. Central, which is 22:47 UTC, according to Space.com, which headlined the flight as an ambitious 22-hour test.
When is the Starship ship catch attempt?
The ship is due to return to Starbase on Saturday, about 22 hours and 32 minutes after liftoff, so around 21:15 UTC. StockTitan says a deorbit burn is scheduled about 21 hours and 36 minutes into the flight, and that the catch goes ahead only if the team confirms the reentry, landing burn and tower-approach systems are healthy. Otherwise the ship would come down over the ocean at a planned point.
A ship caught by the tower after a return from orbit would be a first for Starship, which makes that attempt the real test of the flight. The booster miss on Friday is a setback for the V3 booster, and SpaceX has not yet said what it learned. The next marker is the deorbit decision on Saturday evening UTC, and SpaceX has not said what it will do if the ship fails one of its checks.
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