With Starfall, SpaceX eyes an edge in global cargo delivery from orbit

The FAA’s environmental review approved SpaceX’s proposal for two Starfall reentry demonstrations. It did not specify if these demos would happen on one or two missions. SpaceX intends to recover the vehicle, including parachutes and heat shields, “to the to the maximum extent practicable,” the FAA said.

The Starfall vehicle is cylindrical in shape, with a diameter of 10.2 feet (3.1 meters) and a height of 2.5 feet (0.75 meters). Starfall weighs approximately 4,600 pounds (2.1 metric tons) with capacity for about 2,200 pounds (1 metric ton) of payload, for a total weight of 6,800 pounds (3.1 metric tons). Designed exclusively for cargo, Starfall is smaller than SpaceX’s human-rated Crew Dragon spacecraft used for ferrying astronauts to and from the International Space Station.

The first Starfall Demo mission will spend a few hours in low-Earth orbit, but the vehicle could also fly on shorter suborbital trajectories after launching on either Falcon 9 or the much larger Starship rocket. This version of Starfall is not capable of de-orbiting itself, but instead relies upon its launch vehicle to guide it back into the atmosphere. After separating from its rocket carrier, the disc-shaped vehicle uses compressed nitrogen gas to point its heat shield in the right direction for reentry.

So who might use something like Starfall? The US military is one obvious answer. The Pentagon is already working with SpaceX on a concept named Rocket Cargo or Point-to-Point Delivery, which would use Starship to deliver massive loads of equipment and supplies to far-flung locations in less than an hour. Starship is an enormous vehicle, nearly 20 stories tall and 30 feet wide, that must land at prepared sites. Starfall could prove to be a more versatile option for lighter deliveries.

The military has also signed agreements with Blue Origin, Rocket Lab, and Anduril for studies and development of technologies for global cargo delivery from space. Notwithstanding Starship, which is still undergoing experimental flight tests, SpaceX may have an early advantage with the Starfall delivery vehicle.