Published 5/22/2026, 11:20:43 AM · Updated 5/22/2026, 3:18:09 PMBy TheBriefWire Editorial Team
Key points
Welcome to Edition 8.42 of the Rocket Report!
SpaceX nearly launched its Starship rocket on Thursday amid much pomp and circumstance in South Texas, only to be foiled by a ground system issue.
Such delays are to be expected, with almost entirely new hardware on both the rocket and the ground side of things.
The company will try again as soon as Friday evening, and as we discuss in this week’s report, the stakes are quite high for SpaceX and much of the rest of the US spaceflight enterprise.
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