SpaceX's quest to rescue the upper section of its massive Starship rocket from the sea does not appear to be destined for a triumphant end.
Space enthusiasts have been following the thrilling saga ever since the 171-foot upper-stage of the rocket, designed to fly in space, landed intact in the Indian Ocean
. The accomplishment – coming during the 13th overall Starship flight test – marked a major milestone for SpaceX as it works to develop the rocket for future crewed missions to the moon and Mars.It also meant that the large piece of hardware was floating in the ocean, just asking to be grabbed and hauled back to shore. But the unforgiving nature of the vast ocean appears to have hampered operations to recover the upper-stage.
Now, tech mogul
Elon Musk says his company's effort to get the spacecraft back to land is "not looking good."
Here's the latest on SpaceX's attempt to recover the upper-stage of the Starship that launched from South Texas.
SpaceX launches Starship megarocket on flight 13 from Texas
SpaceX's Starship rocket, the latest prototype of which stands at 407 feet tall when fully stacked, most recently got off the ground July 24 on a mission referred to as flight 13.
The 236-foot first-stage booster known as Super Heavy provided the initial burst of thrust at liftoff, which took place at SpaceX's Starbase company town and headquarters in Texas near the U.S.-Mexico border. Following stage separation minutes later, the booster made a water landing off the Gulf coast of Texas while the upper-stage continued on into suborbital space.
Along the way, the vehicle hit a number of SpaceX's objectives for it, including the short-lived deployment of operational Starlink satellites that demised as intended in Earth's atmosphere.
SpaceX's efforts to recover Ship 40 'not looking good,' Musk says
Miraculously, the upper-stage survived the one-hour flight after landing in the Indian Ocean – marking a major first for SpaceX as the company aims to design both stages of the rocket to eventually be reusable.
In the weeks since, SpaceX teams have been seen on boats working to haul the rocket back to the shore of Australia, the nearest body of land.
But SpaceX's efforts to recover this particular upper-stage, designated Ship 40, are increasingly looking improbable. While boats have attached a line to Ship 40 and begun towing it through the sea, teams have faced "challenging conditions and increasingly rough seas," SpaceX said in an Aug. 7 post on social media site X, its latest update on the operation.
The SpaceX Recovery team is still working to recover Flight 13’s Starship from the Indian Ocean. They’ve been overcoming challenging conditions and increasingly rough seas as they attempt to guide the 52m long spacecraft to port pic.twitter.com/ECT5FyCvr7
— SpaceX (@SpaceX) August 7, 2026
The dire situation prompted Musk, who founded SpaceX in 2002 and serves as its chief executive, to admit in a comment that "recovery is not looking good right now."
Exposure to saltwater had likely rendered the upper-stage unusable on future mission anyway, but SpaceX had hoped to recover the spacecraft to analyze Ship 40 up close.
"We were able to obtain close-up photos of critical regions of the heat shield and engines for future upgrades," Musk said.
How did Starship upper-stage land intact without exploding?
SpaceX plans to one day be able to consistently return the upper-stage of the Starship spacecraft for a controlled landing after flight so that it can be reused on future flights. While the company already reuses lower-stage boosters on its smaller Falcon 9 rocket – and even reused a Super Heavy booster on a Starship – a rapidly reusable upper-stage that has traveled to and from space would be unprecedented in the spaceflight industry.
But SpaceX did not expect Ship 40 to survive the test flight.
In the July flight test, though, the vehicle managed to keep all six of its Raptor-class engines running to make a controlled landing following a dangerous reentry into Earth's atmosphere. SpaceX later dubbed the landing as its "softest" splashdown to date, while SpaceX spokesman Dan Huot described it during the livestream as a "dream scenario."
Because the landing was so gentle, Ship 40 was able to slowly tip over and float in the Indian Ocean without exploding or sinking, as prior prototypes have done.
What is SpaceX's Starship megarocket?
SpaceX has been testing Starship since April 2023 on a series of flights from Starbase as it develops the massive rocket for future spaceflight missions, including interplanetary travel.
Musk's vision has long been for Starship to be the vehicle that takes humans to Mars, where they can establish a self-sustaining colony. While Musk has indicated that SpaceX will focus on building a lunar city first, the company has already announced a human-led expedition to Mars' orbit – though it has not set a target date.
SpaceX is also under contract with NASA to develop a lunar lander configuration of its Starship, known as the Human Landing System, to ferry astronauts to the moon under the U.S. space agency's Artemis program.
Eric Lagatta is the Space Connect reporter for the USA TODAY Network. Reach him at elagatta@usatodayco.com
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: After historic landing, SpaceX may lose Starship to the sea, Musk says
