SpaceX launched Starship megarocket test flight with an unusual cargo. A banana!
The Super Heavy Starship rocket was launched from Elon Musk's company's Starbase in South Texas on Wednesday.
In an amusing move, Elon Musk's SpaceX launched its mega rocket, Starship, on its sixth test flight with a banana as its cargo.
The banana, tied inside the spacecraft's cargo, was a strategic move made by the space company for the November 20 launch, which took place from SpaceX's Starbase in South Texas.
Hours before the takeoff, the Starlink X account posted, “Today's Starship flight test has a special payload onboard - a banana! This universally-accepted measurement of scale is approximately the size of one Starlink Mini.”
Super Heavy Starship rocket
The aim of the Starship 6 test flight is to "expand the envelope on ship and booster capabilities and get closer to bringing reuse of the entire system online".
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The objective of this was also the booster catch at the launch site, reigniting a ship Raptor engine while in space, and testing a suite of heatshield experiments and maneuvering changes for ship reentry and descent over the Indian Ocean.
SpaceX, on its website, has described Starship as a "super heavy rocket", which represents a fully reusable transportation system made to carry both crew and cargo to the Earth orbit, the Moon, Mars and beyond. "Starship is the world's most powerful launch vehicle ever developed, capable of carrying up to 150 metric tonnes fully reusable and 250 metric tonnes expendable," it added.
The Starship megarocket lifted off from the Starbase site in South Texas at 5 pm EST. The test flight, though had a rough landing trajectory, made a safe landing in the Indian Ocean. Kate Tice, a SpaceX engineer, was cited by CNN as saying, "Turns out the vehicle had more capability than our calculations predicted, and that is why we test like we fly."
Star of the show
While the launch and splash down of the Super Heavy rocket was indeed a sight, the focus remained on the "banana" cargo. SpaceX engineer Kate Tice said, "Bananas have been used for quick visual comparisons for quite some time, and our teammates thought it was time to bring the venerated yellow fruit to Starship."
According to an India Today report, SpaceX went the non-traditional way and used this banana payload to understand the regulatory process of the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) for payload approvals.
The primary role of the banana was to reportedly act as a zero-gravity indicator.
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Meanwhile, SpaceX even offered a "Banana (For Scale)" merchandise on its website for promoting the humour over the payload humour before Starship's launch.
Netizens on social media reacted to the use of banana in the spacecraft's cargo, with an X user saying, "That's amazing! I like your banana team!"
"Banana, for scale!" chuckled another. One reacted to the banana merchandise sale on SpaceX and said, "Genius marketing, official plushy banana from SpaceX."
President-elect Trump watches takeoff with Musk
President-elect Donald Trump was at the SpaceX Starbase with Elon Musk, who was picked by the Republican for leading the government efficiency department with Vivek Ramaswamy.
Musk had supported Trump's presidential campaign and called on Americans to vote for him in the 2024 race to the White House.
In videos that surfaced from the Starship launch, Trump, Musk, and other Republican and SpaceX officials were seen holding conversations.
Social media was seemingly flooded with images of Musk and Trump's camaraderie.
