THE NEW SPACE RACE: SpaceX’s Starship has ‘decent chance’ of success on upcoming flight, Elon Musk says.

Flight 2, as Musk calls the upcoming Starship launch, will include key changes SpaceX recently implemented to Starship. For example: The company aims to “hot stage” the system, meaning that Starship will light its second-stage engines before the vehicle’s two stages have fully separated.

While the Soviet Union made use of hot staging before, Musk said it’s the first time SpaceX will attempt it. “I’d say that’s the riskiest part of the flight,” he said. “If the engines light and the ship doesn’t blow itself up during staging, then I think we’ve got a decent chance of reaching orbit.”

Presuming that happens according to plan, Starship will make less than a complete orbit of Earth and splash down in the Pacific off the coast of Hawaii, he said. The next key test in-flight will be the heat shield, so far untested.

“We think it will work, but we aren’t sure if it will work,” Musk said of the heat shield. “So if it doesn’t work, we want it to not work over the Pacific — which is a large body of water with almost no people on it.”

But: “While SpaceX said it has implemented all 57 actions required for the next flight and completed its investigation, the FAA has not yet awarded a license for the second launch.”