Frost building on the SpaceX booster rocket indicates it is fueling. It could about 15-30 minutes or so from a static fire of the 33 raptor engines.
Booster 7’s been loaded (partial) for the test. The T-10 minute siren went a few minutes ago.
Holding at T-minus 40 seconds.
Static fire happened. 31 engines fired overall.
Team turned off 1 engine just before start & 1 stopped itself, so 31 engines fired overall.
But still enough engines to reach orbit! https://t.co/QYx3oVM4Gw
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) February 9, 2023
Attempting Starship 33 engine static fire https://t.co/FJ3tLsnlck
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) February 9, 2023
Booster 7's been loaded (partial) for the test. Now we wait for the T-10 minute siren.https://t.co/kMGfaJbudD pic.twitter.com/vIjKLk0gZF
— Chris Bergin – NSF (@NASASpaceflight) February 9, 2023
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Ma-Maw! Elon’s been lighting his farts again!
Hopefully they’ll be able to get all 33 at some point in the near future, but it’s good to know that it can reach orbit with 31. That was an awesome thing to see.
Having 33 engines means 33 times as many chances for one to fail, so you’d better not rely on them all working to make orbit. But I do wonder why they took that one engine offline before the launch.
I expect this will lead to another test fire with all 33 engines; The point of having a couple spare engines is lost if you start out with two not working.