News
SpaceX Starship eyes Tuesday launch after FAA communication breakdown causes delays
Two new sourced reports suggest that SpaceX’s fast-moving approach to Starship development and a shocking level of naivety and ineptitude on behalf of the FAA’s regulatory responsibilities combined to delay the latest Starship test flight.
As previously discussed on Teslarati, SpaceX was clearly and publicly targeting a Starship launch as early as 12pm to 5pm on Monday, March 29th after unknown issues delayed a Friday attempt. Those plans were writ large on SpaceX’s own website and via CEO Elon Musk’s tweets a full three days before launch and confirmed by road closures, notices to mariners, and the FAA’s own flight restrictions and advisories 24-48 hours prior. Around 11am CDT Monday, Musk revealed that SpaceX had been forced to call off the day’s launch attempt because an FAA-required inspector was “unable to reach” Boca Chica in time.
Now, per reports separately corroborated by The Verge reporter Joey Roulette and Washington Post reporter Christian Davenport, a clearer picture of what exactly transpired is available.
Roulette first broke the news, offering a better look at a portion of the debacle. Per “a source,” SpaceX had apparently told the FAA inspector – who had been waiting all week for Starship SN11’s launch debut – that plans for a Monday recycle had been canceled. The inspector then flew home to Florida. However, as things often do and have, the situation rapidly changed and SpaceX suddenly found itself in a position to launch on Monday.
According to the apparent FAA-side source, SpaceX dropped that change of plans on the agency’s lap late on Sunday, leading the inspector to “[scramble]” onto a Monday flight that was somehow too late to arrive before the 5pm CDT end of Starship’s test window. In a statement, the FAA chided SpaceX, stating that the company “must provide adequate notice of its launch schedule to allow for a safety inspector to travel to Boca Chica.”
Under that description of events, it would be hard not to find SpaceX clearly in the wrong. Mere hours of notice – and only offered late on Sunday evening – would make it difficult for anyone to abruptly arrange a 1300-mile, multi-stop flight. At the same time, though, someone capable of singlehandedly scrubbing an entire rocket launch attempt on a whim (or an accident) is obviously not just “anyone” and a functional regulatory apparatus probably wouldn’t leave the entirety of that substantial responsibility up to a single employee.
As it so happened, Roulette’s source only offer part of the picture. According to Christian Davenport and his sources, SpaceX (or someone) did tell the FAA inspector that it was safe to head home on Friday because the company was struggling to secure road closures from Cameron County for a Monday launch attempt. Apparently, the issue was so extreme that SpaceX wasn’t sure if a launch on any day of the next week would be possible.
However, sometime early on Sunday morning, SpaceX secured a road closure for a Monday Starship launch attempt. According to Davenport, SpaceX emailed the FAA inspector but he “didn’t see the email,” which presumably served as a notice of plans for a Starship launch attempt. Logically, SpaceX then began attempting to call the FAA (inspector?) but didn’t get an answer or call back until “late Sunday night.”
Via Cameron County’s explicitly public road closure announcement website, Monday’s road closure was granted no later than 11am CDT. Assuming SpaceX emailed the FAA inspector around then, that email effectively served as a notice of launch plans more than 24 hours before the window was scheduled to open. If SpaceX didn’t somehow forget to email until hours later, Davenport’s description implies that it took SpaceX hours of constant phone calls before the FAA finally responded.
If that series of events is accurate, as it seems to be, it’s a searing indictment of systematic ineptitude and laziness on behalf of the FAA. Having changed SpaceX’s Starship launch license to necessitate the presence of an FAA inspector mere weeks ago, thus giving a single person the power to scrub an entire launch attempt, the regulatory agency appears to have entrusted the entirety of that responsibility to a single “inspector.” Knowing full well that SpaceX works continuously with multiple shifts after almost two years of managing Starhopper and Starship tests, hops, and launches, the FAA then failed to ensure that some kind of communications infrastructure was in place to keep SpaceX appraised about the availability of a single inspector it now fully hinged on for all future Starship launches.
If, as the phrasing in both reports suggests, the FAA allotted a single government inspector to preside over all future Starship launches, that alone would bely a ridiculous level of ineptitude and naivete (or ignorance). To then trust that single person with nearly all of the responsibility of maintaining contact with SpaceX, day and night, would be akin to the FAA consciously guaranteeing that a disruptive breakdown in communications like this one would happen.
All told, SpaceX likely also needs to do some recalibration to better mesh and coexist with the FAA’s glacial reaction time and pace of work. However, the FAA is not going to be winning any favors if it continues to manage SpaceX’s Starship licensing in a manner as inept and cavalier as it has been. Far more importantly, if the FAA – one of the largest, best-funded regulatory bodies responsible for ensuring the safety of some of the most complex systems and vehicles on Earth – is unable to perform tasks as rudimentary as scheduling and contingency planning, it’s difficult to imagine how that same office could be trusted to regulate – and make safer – systems as extraordinarily complex as launch vehicles.
With any luck, the FAA will prove that the last four months have been minor bumps in the road to reliably and professionally licensing and regulating SpaceX’s Starship launch vehicle. However, after two separate demonstrations of systematic mismanagement over a mere four Starship launch attempts, it’s becoming harder and harder to soundly argue that the FAA still deserves the benefit of the doubt.
Assuming the FAA inspector is on schedule, Starship SN11’s next launch attempt is now scheduled between 7am and 3pm CDT (UTC-5) on Tuesday, March 30th.
News
Tesla to make app change for easier communication following Service
“Looking into it. After a service visit is complete, we close the in-app messaging option after 2 hours. We will change this to 24hours or more.”
Tesla will enhance the ability to communicate through the mobile app with Service after work has been done on your car.
One of the biggest weaknesses of Tesla’s automotive division has been Service, as Service Centers are not necessarily plentiful, and wait times, in some regions of the country, are over a month in duration.
Getting in touch with Service after a car has work done to it is also difficult. Calling showrooms in some regions has proven to be difficult to enable direct communication between the customer and the company.
If something is not resolved properly, Tesla keeps the in-app messaging option active for two hours after the service visit is complete.
However, that doesn’t resolve everything, as some issues may arise again more than two hours later. Then the issue of communication presents itself once again.
Tesla is going to extend that time frame to a day or more, according to Raj Jegannathan, Tesla’s AI/IT-Infra, Cybersecurity, IT Apps & Vehicle Service VP.
Looking into it. After a service visit is complete, we close the in-app messaging option after 2 hours. We will change this to 24hours or more.
— Raj Jegannathan (@r_jegaa) August 18, 2025
Tesla has made several changes over the past few years to attempt to improve its Service. Recently, for Collision repair, it started offering a $45-per-day loaner program with free FSD, free tolls, and free Supercharging.
It also recently started sharing local and regional leader contact information so customers have the ability to reach out when they have complaints or disagree with warranty claims, changes in estimates, or initial diagnostics.
Tesla creates clever solution to simplify and improve its Service
However, this is only available at a few showrooms and is currently a pilot program.
These improvements are aimed at resolving communication breakdown, which appears to be a problem that many owners experience.
Tesla is one of the few companies that also operates a fleet of Mobile Repair vehicles, which will perform service at your house or place of business. However, the size of it has gone down by 11 percent year over year.
News
Tesla is overhauling its Full Self-Driving subscription for easier access
The subscription model is more accessible to many owners, as it is reasonably priced and offers the option to take a month off from using it if they are interested in saving money.
Tesla is overhauling its Full Self-Driving subscription and how it markets it to customers after several owners and fans of the company complained about the accessibility of the monthly access to its driver assistance suite.
Tesla Full Self-Driving is the automaker’s semi-autonomous driving suite, which is widely regarded as the most robust and capable on the market today. Owners can purchase the suite outright for $8,000, or they can subscribe to the program for $99 per month, an option it enabled a few years ago.
However, it is not super easy to subscribe to the subscription model, nor is it even recognized on the company’s Online Design Studio. Without some research or prior knowledge, a consumer might not even know they could pay monthly to experience Full Self-Driving.
That is set to change, according to Tesla’s AI/IT Infrastructure, Cybersecurity, IT Apps, and Vehicle Service head Raj Jegannathan, who said the company is planning to change that.
Instead of having customers only have the option to pay outright for the suite, Tesla is now planning to offer the subscription model in its Online Design Studio, making it easier to activate that option:
Yes, will optimize the design to offer both full purchase, subscriptions(with free trial) on the configurator.
— Raj Jegannathan (@r_jegaa) August 24, 2025
It will be the second major change Tesla makes to how it sells Full Self-Driving to customers, the first being videos of real-life operation of FSD in the Design Studio. Previously, the site only showed animations of Full Self-Driving’s capabilities.
Tesla added the videos of FSD handling some tricky situations, as well as general operation of the suite, to the Design Studio in recent weeks.
Tesla makes big change to encourage Full Self-Driving purchases
The subscription model is more accessible to many owners, as it is reasonably priced and offers the option to take a month off from using it if they are interested in saving money.
Many cannot justify paying for the suite outright, especially as it adds $8,000 to the cost of their car. After they experience its capabilities for themselves, they might.
Both moves appear to be an effort to increase the take rate of Full Self-Driving, particularly as autonomy takes center stage at Tesla.
With the rollout of Robotaxi and some teased capabilities of the upcoming v14 iteration of Full Self-Driving, Tesla is gearing up to continue advancing its self-driving technology.
Tesla (NASDAQ: TSLA) recently talked about a variety of topics with Wall Street firm Piper Sandler, as the firm released a new note on Friday about their meeting with the company’s Investor Relations team.
According to the note from Piper Sandler, Tesla talked in detail about the Semi program, Optimus, and its potential valuation given its capabilities, the rollout of Robotaxi in Austin, and Full Self-Driving progress in the United States.
Tesla Semi Ramp
The Tesla Semi is set to enter mass production in 2026 at a dedicated factory near the company’s Gigafactory in Reno, Nevada.
The Semi has already been in pilot program testing, as Tesla has partnered with a few companies, like Frito-Lay and PepsiCo., to perform regional logistics. It has been met with excellent reviews from drivers, and it has helped give Tesla a good idea of what to expect when it makes its way to more companies in the coming years.
Piper Sandler said that it is evident Tesla is preparing for a “major ramp,” but it is keeping its expectations low:
“We’ve never expected much from this product, but we’d love to be proven wrong (Tesla is clearly prepping for a major ramp).”
Tesla Optimus and its value internally and externally
Optimus has been working in Tesla factories for some time, but its expectations as a product offering outside of the company internally have major implications.
Its role within Tesla factories, for now, is relatively low, but Optimus is still doing things to assist. By this time next year, Piper Sandler said Optimus should have bigger responsibilities:
“By this time in 2026, Optimus should be moving/staging parts within Tesla’s facilities.”
Outside of Tesla, Optimus could be a major beneficiary for companies as it could be a more affordable way to handle tedious tasks and manual labor. The firm believes that if Optimus can work 18-hour shifts, a cost of $100,000 per unit “would be justified.”
Tesla Robotaxi Expansion
The big focus of the firm with Robotaxi was Tesla’s expansion of the geofence in Austin this week. It was substantial, bringing the Robotaxi’s total service area to around 170 square miles, up from the roughly 90 square miles that rival Waymo is offering in the city.
Tesla Robotaxi geofence expansion enters Plaid Mode and includes a surprise
Tesla has doubled its geofence three times since its launch in late June, and it also revealed that its fleet of vehicles has expanded by 50 percent. It did not give a solid number of how many vehicles are operating in the fleet.
Tesla Full Self-Driving v14 launch
Tesla’s Full Self-Driving suite is set to have a fresh version, v14, rolled out in either September or October, and there are some pretty high expectations for it.
CEO Elon Musk said:
“The FSD release in about 6 weeks will be a dramatic gain with a 10X higher parameter count and many other improvements. It’s going through training & testing now. Once we confirm real-world safety of FSD 14, which we think will be amazing, the car will nag you much less.”
There is also some expectation that v14 could be the public release of what Tesla is running in Austin for Robotaxi. The firm confirmed this in their note by stating it “should enable Tesla owners to use software that is on par with Robotaxis in Austin.”
The only real hold up would be regulator skepticism, but Tesla can alleviate this with strong data.
The firm maintained its ‘Overweight’ rating and the $400 price target it holds on the stock.
Tesla to make app change for easier communication following Service
Tesla is overhauling its Full Self-Driving subscription for easier access
Tesla talks Semi ramp, Optimus, Robotaxi rollout, FSD with Wall Street firm
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