By Noleetah Alset, H.A.T.E. correspondent

We interrupt your Monday with grim news for the orbit-denial community. At 7:48 AM Central on September 28, Starship lifted off from Starbase, Texas, on its 14th flight. Thirteen flights. Thirteen suborbital hops. An entire cottage industry of "call me when it's in orbit" posts. Somebody should call them.

For a few minutes, the doubters had hope. One of the 33 booster engines cut out about two minutes in, and one of the ship's six Raptors quit around seven minutes in. SpaceX's launch commentator Dan Huot actually told viewers they would not do the burn to orbit. Then came "Actually, stand by," a lot of conversation in the room, and the worst sentence of the morning: "we are go for orbit."

The ship lit a single Raptor for about 19 seconds and entered orbit for the first time, roughly 173 miles up. Then it opened its slot-shaped payload door and, over about half an hour, pushed out all 26 Starlink V3 satellites. SpaceX says the Starlink team made contact with every one of them. Starlink then posted a view from one of the new satellites and thanked SpaceX for the ride. Very rude of it.

In the only development the pessimists can cling to, the mission was shorter than planned. The flight plan called for about six orbits and nearly 10 hours. Instead, SpaceX announced it would deorbit after about 3 hours in orbit, finished the deorbit burn a little after 10 AM CT, and confirmed splashdown in the Pacific just before 11 AM CT. Its post: "Congratulations to the entire SpaceX team on the first orbital flight of Starship!"

The booster gave the critics a crumb: PCMag reports two of the 13 engines needed for its first return burn didn't light. It hit the Gulf a little fast, sank and then exploded, per PCMag's read of the NASASpaceflight stream. It was never going to be caught today. The ship made its own exit: after its landing burn in the Pacific north of Hawaii, it toppled and exploded, per PCMag.

The paperwork was no help either. The FAA issued the Flight 14 launch and reentry license on Saturday, September 26, the last bureaucratic excuse people had left.

ELSEWHERE IN THE WRECKAGE

FALCON 9 LAUNCHES A SECRET, LANDS, SHOWS OFF: On Saturday, Sep 26 at about 9 AM CT, a Falcon 9 launched the classified USSF-385 mission from Vandenberg, and booster 1100 landed on the drone ship Of Course I Still Love You on its 10th flight. That's SpaceX's third Space Force launch in 16 days and Falcon 9's 108th flight of 2026. We'd complain about what's on board, but nobody will tell us.

Satire. AI-generated video & voice. Not independently fact-checked. Entertainment only. Not financial advice.

Here's the painful part: the thing people said Starship couldn't do, it did before lunch. First orbit, 26 working Starlink V3 satellites deployed, and a ship that came home to a planned Pacific splashdown. It was messy (engines out on both stages, a flight cut from about six orbits to about 3 hours in orbit, and a booster that hit the Gulf a little fast, sank and exploded, per PCMag), but the main job got done. Falcon 9 kept flying. Snarky, yes. Made up, no. The numbers are below.

SpaceX on X (Sep 28; times converted to CT): targeting launch 7:48 AM CT; liftoff; Super Heavy splashed down in the Gulf; ascent burn complete, ship on a suborbital trajectory pending checks; 'Go for orbit' with a single-Raptor burn to an ~275 km orbit; 'enters orbit of Earth for the first time' (~8:15 AM CT); payload deploy complete, 'All 26 Starlink V3 satellites are in orbit' (8:54 AM CT); Starlink team made contact with all 26; 'deorbit Starship ... after 3 hours in orbit' (9:17 AM CT); deorbit burn complete (10:04 AM CT); 'Splashdown confirmed ... first orbital flight of Starship!' (10:58 AM CT). Space.com (Sep 28): liftoff 8:48 AM EDT / 7:48 AM Texas time; one of six ship engines went out during ascent; ship entered orbit about 25 min after liftoff. PCMag (Sep 28): 19-second orbital insertion burn to about 173 miles; one of 33 booster engines cut out ~2 min after liftoff; a ship Raptor cut out ~7 min after launch; Dan Huot at first said the orbital burn would not happen, then announced go for orbit; all 26 V3 satellites out by 9:53 AM ET; two of 13 booster engines failed to ignite for the first return burn, and NASASpaceflight's stream showed the booster hitting the Gulf a little fast, sinking and exploding. Aviation Week (Sep 27): FAA issued the Flight 14 launch and reentry license Sep 26; nominal plan of six orbits and a 9 hr 50 min mission ending in the Pacific. Space.com (Sep 26): Falcon 9 launched classified USSF-385 from Vandenberg at 10 AM EDT (9 AM CT); booster 1100 landed on OCISLY on its 10th flight; SpaceX's 3rd Space Force launch in 16 days; 108th Falcon 9 flight of 2026.