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SpaceX’s orbital Starship prototype sheds tiles, comes to life during first tests
After weeks of mostly invisible – albeit slow and steady – work at Starbase’s suborbital launch and test facilities, SpaceX has finally kicked off the first orbital Starship prototype’s first test campaign.
Almost two months ago, Starship 20 (S20) departed the factory it was built in for the first time and was rolled a few miles down a South Texas highway to Starbase’s nascent orbital launch site. There, SpaceX briefly installed Ship 20 on top of Super Heavy Booster 4 (B4) – an important first and one done with the same ship and booster pair CEO Elon Musk says could eventually support the rocket’s inaugural orbital launch attempt. Mere hours after that August 6th photo opportunity and fit test, Ship 20 was rolled back to the Starbase build site for another week of work before again returning to the launch site.
This time around, Starship S20 headed for one of two suborbital launch and test stands and ultimately spent the better part of the next six weeks sitting in place as workers swarmed around the 50m (~165 ft) tall spacecraft and upper stage to prepare it for the next steps. In theory, those steps were simple enough, beginning with the completion of two basic qualification tests – the same tests that a half-dozen prototypes preceding Ship 20 completed without issue.
Effectively SpaceX’s first Starship or Super Heavy test of any kind in more than two months, it thankfully didn’t take long for things to get interesting. Before the pad had even been cleared of the last few remaining workers, Starship S20 violently shed a good dozen or so fragile heat shield tiles. CEO Elon Musk quickly confirmed speculation that Starship S20 had effectively jetted the tiles off its nose during a brief test of high-pressure cold gas maneuvering thrusters, coincidentally around the same time as SpaceX began to pressurize the rocket for its first tests.
Going into what was believed to be Starship S20’s first ambient-temperature pressure test and cryogenic proof test, the loss of some heat shield tiles was almost universally expected. In a structure as large as Starship, even just the thermal contraction of steel at supercool temperatures (and expansion as it warms back up) could change the rocket’s diameter an inch or so, potentially causing tiles to scrape or press against each other. About the size of a dinner plate and the thickness of an average paperback book, Starship’s ceramic heat shield tiles have proven to be very fragile, with dozens routinely chipping, cracking, and shattering during and after installation on Ship 20.
One unique (and no less unproven) aspect of Starship is SpaceX’s decision to mount its heat shield directly to the thin steel propellant tanks and skin that make up the rocket’s entire airframe. SpaceX’s first stab at the problem involves studs/pins welded – by robot – directly to the exterior of Starship’s tanks and skin. By embedding small metal plates inside each cast tile, they can be easily installed by aligning the tile and pressing it against each set of three barb-like pins, which then irreversibly lock in place. Over most of Starship’s hull, SpaceX then tacks on blankets of off-the-shelf ceramic wool insulation before tiles are installed on top of that steel and blanket sandwich. Compared to the Space Shuttle and Russia’s Buran, the only other orbital spacecraft to fly with non-ablative heat shields, Starship’s thermal protection system (TPS) is incredibly simple. Of course, the challenges imposed on heat shields by mechanical stresses during launch/landing, orbital reentry, and a need for rapid reusability are anything but simple.
As such, to see tiles blown off Starship S20 by cold gas maneuvering thrusters that were simply placed too close to adjacent TPS was an unexpected route to an expected outcome. During Monday’s nine-hour test window, SpaceX appeared to partially or fully pressurize Starship S20 at ambient temperatures before aborting a cryogenic proof test either before or just after it began. While an ambient-temperature proof was the easier of the two tests on the docket, it’s still encouraging to see no obvious tile loss caused by the actual mechanical stresses involved in the test.
Most importantly, compared to losing dozens of tiles to regular mechanical or thermal stresses, fixing an issue with thruster impingement is much easier and should only require a few design tweaks to one specific Starship component. The real nail-biting moments will come during Starship S20’s seemingly imminent cryogenic proof and static fire debuts, major TPS issues during either of which could necessitate vehicle-wide design changes and cause delays.
With any luck, whatever forced SpaceX to abort Starship S20’s first cryogenic proof test can be easily rectified, opening the door for additional attempts. Two more test windows are scheduled later this week from 5pm to 11pm CDT on Tuesday and Wednesday. Rewatch today’s brief testing below.
Elon Musk
Nvidia’s board meets on Jensen Huang, and Elon Musk already has an answer
Elon Musk says it would be an honor to hire Jensen Huang amid Nvidia turmoil.
Elon Musk says he would welcome Jensen Huang at one of his companies if Nvidia’s board decides to push out its longtime chief executive.
On Wednesday evening, the financial account ZeroHedge posted “Elon please hire Jensen” on X. Musk replied roughly two hours later: “That would be an honor.” Neither Huang nor Nvidia had responded publicly as of Wednesday night.
Musk’s reply came as Nvidia’s board met to decide Huang’s future. The Wall Street Journal reported that directors were preparing to oust him following reports of two extramarital relationships. One involves Alice Huang, a Singapore-based businesswoman whom U.S. intelligence officials reportedly believe was working for China’s Ministry of State Security. The New York Times separately reported a relationship with Kimberly Powell, Nvidia’s vice president of health care. Huang acknowledged being unfaithful in a memo to employees on Sunday but gave no details.
@zerohedge That would be an honor
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 12, 2026
Under Nvidia’s bylaws, a majority of its 11 directors can remove the CEO with or without cause. Bloomberg reported that the board has been working with an outside firm on possible replacements and may name an interim chief, with CFO Colette Kress seen as the likely pick. Nvidia shares fell more than 8 percent in extended trading, according to CNBC, and the company is scheduled to report quarterly earnings on November 17.
Musk has more riding on Nvidia’s leadership than most tech executives. In August, he told investors on SpaceX’s first earnings call as a public company that it would build its AI infrastructure exclusively on Nvidia hardware, calling Vera Rubin “the best architecture.” SpaceX is also working with Nvidia on the compute payload for Starmind, its planned orbital AI constellation. In October, SpaceX said it had a binding commitment for a roughly $40 billion lease of Vera Rubin GPUs and related equipment, with the leases expected to begin in the first half of 2027.
The scale of that dependence is already enormous. On its Q3 call, SpaceX said it was bringing roughly 200,000 to 220,000 Nvidia GB300 GPUs online each month and expects 2.5 to 3 GW of nameplate compute by the end of the year. That buildout is now reaching new sites like the proposed $24 billion power plant and supercomputer campus at Starbase.
The relationship between the two executives also goes back nearly a decade. Huang has often told the story of personally delivering Nvidia’s first DGX-1 AI supercomputer to Musk in 2016, when no other customer wanted one. “Nobody wanted to be part of it, except for Elon,” Huang said on the Joe Rogan Experience last December.
Musk did not say what role Huang might fill, and his reply stops short of a formal offer. Huang co-founded Nvidia in 1993 and still owns about 3.6 percent of its stock, so any move to a Musk company would depend on whether, and how, he leaves the chipmaker he has run for more than three decades.
SpaceX officially launched the Starlink Mini 2 on November 10, delivering the first portable Starlink terminal designed around independent power.
Invitation-only preorders for select U.S. customers are priced at $999 plus tax, a figure that includes a full year of Roam Unlimited service valued at roughly $2,100. A refundable $100 deposit reserves the kit, with the balance due at shipment, expected to begin in mid-December. Broader availability is listed as coming soon.
Starlink just unveiled Mini 2, its next-gen portable dish.
Quick-swap battery, up to 4.5 hrs per charge
USB-C power
Built-in Wi-Fi
Online in about 60 secondsPreorders are open now. https://t.co/QawqgbswrQ
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) November 10, 2026
The headline feature is the quick-swap 71 Wh battery. Clipped to the rear of the dish without tools, it delivers up to 4.5 hours of connectivity on a single charge.
The 490-gram pack includes its own USB-C port and LED indicators, so users can charge a spare separately and swap it in seconds while staying online. Starlink notes that the terminal can continue operating while the battery charges or run directly from a 60 W USB-C source. The retail box includes one battery, a 60 W USB-C charger, and a 3-meter cable.
Beyond power, the Mini 2 is thinner at 23.1 mm (versus 38.5 mm on the original Mini) while measuring 263 × 314 mm. With the battery and kickstand attached it weighs 1.6 kg.
Built-in Wi-Fi 6 expands coverage to up to 1,800 square feet, an IP67 rating protects against dust and water, and a standard 1/4-20 tripod thread plus physical power button round out the design. Field of view remains 110 degrees, and the unit retains support for mobile use.
For travelers, campers, and remote workers, the swappable battery removes the longstanding requirement for an external power bank or vehicle outlet that defined the first Mini. Spare packs sold separately further extend runtime, turning the compact terminal into a more self-contained solution.
While the bundled $999 invitation price sits well above the original Mini’s current $149 starting point, the included year of service and genuine untethered operation mark a clear step forward in portable satellite internet.
Elon Musk
SpaceX’s $24B Starbase supercomputer plan slipped past a key roadblock
SpaceX wants a Starbase tax break for a $24 billion gas plant and supercomputer campus.
SpaceX is asking its own company town for a tax break on a $24 billion natural gas power plant and supercomputing facility at Starbase, Texas, and the land it picked sits just outside the reach of a data center moratorium that took effect in neighboring Brownsville last week.
A City of Starbase public hearing notice says SpaceX “proposes to construct, own, and operate a gas-fired power plant and super-compute facility” on roughly 444 acres between Boca Chica Boulevard and the Port of Brownsville. The $24 billion figure covers only the initial phases, and the notice leaves room for future expansions. The Starbase City Commission will consider a property tax abatement and a related economic development agreement at a 7 p.m. hearing on December 9. The notice does not disclose the size or length of the abatement, or how much computing capacity the site would hold.
The location has a history. Over the summer, SpaceX asked Brownsville to remove the tract from its city limits and offered $220 million for water and wastewater projects in return. Brownsville approved the move in August, and Starbase later annexed the land. Brownsville’s own 90-day pause on data center applications took effect last week, and had the tract stayed inside the city, the project likely would have needed a different home.
The power side is already in front of state regulators. SpaceX has applied to the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality for air permits covering 35 mobile gas turbines producing roughly 750 megawatts, according to Politico, which also noted that two of the three Starbase commissioners voting on the incentives are SpaceX executives.
Building its own plant lets SpaceX skip the Texas grid. Gov. Greg Abbott paused new data center grid connections in August pending an audit, but a facility that generates its own electricity does not need one. The air permit still has to clear the TCEQ, where Abbott also ordered a halt on data center permits.
The bigger test arrives in January. Governor-elect Gina Hinojosa, who unseated Abbott last week, has said she will block data center approvals until the legislature passes new protections, and she has already asked state officials to hold off on any sale of Boca Chica State Park to SpaceX until she is sworn in. Tesla and SpaceX shares both fell the day after the election, and Musk’s first reaction on X was “Data centers in space looking pretty appealing right now.”
That line points to Starmind, SpaceX’s orbital compute constellation. Musk has said terrestrial compute will be “peanuts compared to orbital compute” and expects monthly orbital deployments to pass ground deployments around the end of 2028, as Teslarati reported. Until then, SpaceX still needs gigawatts on the ground. It ended the third quarter with 1.7 GW of nameplate compute, is targeting 2.5 to 3 GW by the end of this year and wants at least 10 GW more in 2027. Its existing Colossus sites around Memphis already run on gas turbines and face a lawsuit from residents over emissions.
Local reaction is split. The South Texas Environmental Justice Network has announced a protest, citing air quality, water use and energy bills, while some Brownsville residents told the Tribune they welcome the jobs. SpaceX did not respond to the Tribune’s questions about the project.
Nvidia’s board meets on Jensen Huang, and Elon Musk already has an answer
Starlink Mini 2 arrives with one feature for true off-grid connectivity
