SpaceX Returns Flown Starship to Starbase for the First Time After Space Mission
SpaceX has achieved another major milestone in its Starship development program by bringing a flown Starship upper stage back to its launch site for the first time. The spacecraft, known as Ship 40, is now standing upright inside the company’s Megabay facility at Starbase in Texas, where engineers will study the vehicle after its journey to space, reentry, ocean landing, and recovery.
Ship 40 launched on July 24 during Starship’s 13th integrated test flight. Riding atop a Super Heavy booster, the 52-meter-tall upper stage completed a suborbital mission before performing a controlled splashdown in the Indian Ocean. What made this flight especially important was that, unlike earlier Starship vehicles that were destroyed after impact with the water, Ship 40 survived largely intact and remained afloat.
That survival gave SpaceX a rare opportunity: recover a flown Starship upper stage and examine it in detail.
While the flight to space lasted only a short time, bringing the spacecraft back to Texas was a far longer challenge. Recovery crews spent 24 days towing Ship 40 through rough ocean conditions before reaching waters near Australia’s Christmas Island in August. Once there, engineers inspected the spacecraft and removed samples from its heat shield for closer analysis.
After the initial inspection, Ship 40 was loaded onto the semi-submersible transport vessel Forte for the trip back to the United States. The ship arrived at the Port of Brownsville on October 7. From there, the Starship upper stage was transported overland to Starbase, lifted vertically, and moved into the Megabay hangar, where it now sits alongside newer Starship vehicles.
SpaceX confirmed the return of Ship 40 on October 13, describing the recovered spacecraft as a valuable source of real-world flight data. Engineers will now examine key systems including the heat shield, Raptor engines, avionics, structure, and other components that endured launch, spaceflight, atmospheric reentry, and ocean recovery.
This is especially important for SpaceX’s long-term goal of making Starship fully reusable. The company has already demonstrated progress with Super Heavy booster recovery, including catching boosters using the launch tower’s giant mechanical arms. However, SpaceX has not yet attempted a tower catch of the Starship upper stage.
Studying Ship 40 could help the company improve the vehicle’s thermal protection system, strengthen hardware for repeated flights, and better understand how Starship performs after reentry. Data from the recovered spacecraft may also influence future design upgrades as SpaceX moves closer to rapid reusability.
Elon Musk has previously suggested that Starship Flight 15 could potentially include the first attempt to catch a returning upper stage using the launch tower’s mechanical arms, if the spacecraft and ground systems are ready. SpaceX has not yet confirmed an official launch date for the next Starship test flight.
For now, Ship 40’s return to Starbase marks a key step forward. Instead of relying only on telemetry and debris analysis, SpaceX now has an intact flown Starship upper stage to inspect inside its own facility. That could provide some of the most valuable engineering data yet for the future of Starship launches, orbital missions, lunar landings, Mars transport, and fully reusable spaceflight.
