SpaceX Starship launch aborted on the pad at the last moment

SpaceX’s mega Starship rocket came within a second or so from blasting off on a test flight Thursday but some of the engines failed to start, triggering a launch abort.

Elon Musk's company said it will have to figure out what went wrong before making another attempt to send Starship on a space-skimming journey halfway around the world. It was supposed to be the 13th flight for Starship, which at 407 feet (124 meters) tall with 33 main engines is the world’s biggest and most powerful rocket.

SpaceX's launch webcast showed the start of engine ignition three seconds before the planned liftoff, viewed from a drone high above the pad. Although the company did not elaborate, on-screen data showed four engines not firing, with the remaining 29 engines immediately shutting down and keeping the rocket anchored to the pad. It was the first time a full-scale Starship experienced a last-second abort like this.

The launch team immediately began draining the fuel from the rocket.

“Next launch attempt hopefully in a few days,” Musk announced via X.

Everything was going SpaceX's way, even the weather, until the partial engine ignition. In the end, the rocket’s automatic launch system worked as planned by halting everything. Too few operating engines could have doomed the launch. Some earlier Starship flights ended in explosive fireballs.

Twenty of SpaceX's newest and most advanced Starlinks were on board Starship for release during the planned hourlong flight. The internet satellites were going to try communicating with Starlinks already in orbit while taking photos of Starship's heat shield.

Neither the first-stage booster nor spacecraft were meant to be recovered, with both ending up in the sea.

The rocket's automatic launch system worked as planned by halting everything. Too few operating engines could have resulted in a failed launch. Some earlier Starship flights, for example, ended in explosive fireballs.

NASA is counting on Starship to land its astronauts on the moon in the next few years. The space agency has hired SpaceX and Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin to build and fly the lunar landers that will return humanity to the surface of the moon after an absence of more than half a century.

Both companies need to have their landers — Starship and Blue Moon — ready to fly by next year so that the newly named Artemis III crew can practice docking their capsule with them in orbit around Earth. The mission after that — Artemis IV planned for no earlier than 2028 — would use one of those landers to take two astronauts to the moon's south polar region.

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SpaceX's mega rocket Starship stands ready but was aborted before liftoff, in Starbase, Texas, Thursday, July 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Eric Gay)

SpaceX's mega rocket Starship stands ready but was aborted before liftoff, in Starbase, Texas, Thursday, July 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Eric Gay)

SpaceX's mega rocket Starship is prepared for a test flight from Starbase, Texas, Thursday, July 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Eric Gay)

SpaceX's mega rocket Starship begins its take off but is aborted, in Starbase, Texas, Thursday, July 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Eric Gay)

SpaceX's mega rocket Starship begins its take off but is aborted, in Starbase, Texas, Thursday, July 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Eric Gay)

SpaceX's mega rocket Starship stands ready but was aborted before liftoff, in Starbase, Texas, Thursday, July 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Eric Gay)

SpaceX's mega rocket Starship stands ready but was aborted before liftoff, in Starbase, Texas, Thursday, July 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Eric Gay)

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — The United States expanded its airstrike campaign against Iran early Friday by increasingly hitting bridges, part of President Donald Trump's threats to start striking infrastructure to pressure Tehran to ease its chokehold on the Strait of Hormuz. Iran launched new missile attacks against U.S.-allied nations in the Middle East and warned that its attacks would escalate.

The interim ceasefire agreed to last month has collapsed, and the region has endured days of back-and-forth attacks by the U.S. and Iran as they battle for control of the strait. Iranian officials say U.S. strikes have killed more than 35 people and wounded over 300 others, with new casualties reported in Friday's strikes.

When the U.S. and Israel launched the war on Iran on Feb. 28, Tehran effectively closed the strait to shipping traffic, a move that sent the price of oil soaring and gave Iran major leverage in negotiations.

Col. Ebrahim Zolfaghari, a spokesperson for the Iranian military’s Khatam al-Anbiya Central Headquarters, earlier threatened that Iran could launch widespread attacks on “all the infrastructure in the region” if the U.S. acted on Trump 's repeated warnings that America could hit Iranian bridges and power plants.

“Under no circumstances and in no way will we allow America, as a foreign and extraregional country, to interfere in the Strait of Hormuz,” he added. “This is Iran’s invincible red line.”

Associated Press writers Abby Sewell in Beirut, Mae Anderson in New York and Christopher Weber in Los Angeles contributed to this report.

Vehicles drive by a billboard reading in English, "Who is D nexT one?" and "#lindseygraham," referring to late U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham and using the capital letters "D" and "T" in an apparent play on the initials of U.S. President Donald Trump, in downtown Tehran, Iran, Thursday, July 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)

A man waves an Iranian flag beneath a billboard reading in English, "Who is D nexT one?" and "#lindseygraham," referring to late U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham and using the capital letters "D" and "T" in an apparent play on the initials of U.S. President Donald Trump, in downtown Tehran, Iran, Thursday, July 16, 2026. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)

A billboard depicting U.S. President Donald Trump lying on what appears to be a coffin and bearing anti-Trump messages, including the phrase "We Kill Trump," is seen at Islamic Revolution Square in downtown Tehran, Iran, Wednesday, July 15, 2026. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)

Three boys play in the shallow waters of the Strait of Hormuz, as a plume of smoke rises from an explosion in the background, off Bandar Abbas, Iran, Monday, July 13, 2026. (Razieh Poudat/ISNA via AP)