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SpaceX to shrink, tweak Starship’s forward flap design, says Elon Musk
SpaceX CEO Elon Musk says that there is a “slight error” with the current design of Starship’s forward flaps, necessitating a few small but visible changes on future prototypes of the spacecraft.
Measuring 9m (30 ft) wide and approximately 50m (~165 ft) from tip to tail, Starship is the combined upper stage, spacecraft, tanker, and lander of a two-stage, fully-reusable rocket with the same name. While SpaceX has a long ways to go to achieve it, the company’s ambition is for Starship and its Super Heavy booster to be the most easily and quickly reusable spacecraft and rocket booster ever built, nominally enabling the same-day reuse of both.
Beyond a Space Shuttle-style heat shield of blankets and ceramic tiles, the Starship upper stage is meant to achieve that reusability by descending through the atmosphere and landing unlike any other spacecraft, plane, or rocket ever flown. Instead of flying, gliding, or knifing through the atmosphere nose or tail-first, Starship freefalls perpendicular to the ground for the last few dozen kilometers (~10-20 mi) before aggressively flipping into a vertical orientation at the last second and landing propulsively on its tail. Now, according to Elon Musk, two of the four ‘flaps’ that largely make that exotic maneuver possible are set for a small but significant redesign.
Probably slightly further forward, smaller, more inward. No funny looking static aero at top, as static aero no longer directly in flow.— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) August 18, 2021
Over the course of five suborbital test flights of full-scale Starship prototypes completed between December 2020 and May 2021, SpaceX took that exotic landing concept from the drawing board and subscale wind tunnel testing to reality. Though four of those five tests ended in destruction, their respective Starship prototypes really only failed in the last 15-30 seconds of test flights that were more than six minutes long.
After reaching an apogee of 10-12.5 km (~6.2-7.8 mi) over the course of some four and a half minutes, all five Starship prototypes successfully shut down their Raptor engines, tipped over onto their bellies, and then used a combination of small pressurized gas thrusters and four large flaps to stably fall back to Earth. Much like a skydiver can tweak their body, arms, and legs to control their orientation and attitude, Starship uses two pairs of forward and aft flaps to achieve a very similar level of control.
Thanks to Starship’s significant surface area and relatively low mass shortly before landing, that unprecedented freefall-style descent naturally slows the rocket to just 100-200 mph (~50-100 m/s) while simultaneously allowing SpaceX to avoid the massive complexity and added mass of structural wings or fins like those on the Space Shuttle. Further, whereas the Shuttle used its wings to glide (albeit like a brick) and land on very long runways, Starship is designed to use three of its six Raptor engines to flip into a vertical orientation and land much like SpaceX’s own spectacularly successful Falcon boosters.
During the actual process of reentry, in which Starship uses a heat shield made up of ~15,000 ceramic tiles to slow from orbital (Mach 25 or ~7.5 km/s) to subsonic speeds, those same flaps also come in useful to control the vehicle’s angle of attack and thus the degree of extreme heating experienced. According to Musk, to improve the moment arm (i.e. leverage or, all else equal, torque) of Starship’s forward flaps and reduce or remove undesirable aerodynamic characteristics, SpaceX is going to shrink those forward flaps further, move them closer together and more towards the tip of Starship’s nose, and angle them toward the ship’s leeward side (back).
Apparently, those relatively minor changes mean that a portion of Starship’s forward flaps will no longer be directly subjected to reentry heating, potentially allowing SpaceX to entirely remove static “aerocovers” that wrap around the ship’s flaps to prevent superheated plasma and gas from reaching sensitive components. Ironically, SpaceX’s thermal protection team completed the installation of heat shield tiles on one of those forward flap aerocovers for the first time ever just a few days ago – a structure and portion of heat shield that will apparently no longer be needed on future Starships.
For now, though, it looks like Ship 20 will attempt Starship’s first orbital launch with its now-outdated forward flaps. Depending on how far along Ship 21 production is, the next prototype could feasibly sport that new flap design.
News
Tesla Model Y and Model 3 named safest vehicles tested by ANCAP in 2025
According to ANCAP in a press release, the Tesla Model Y achieved the highest overall weighted score of any vehicle assessed in 2025.
The Tesla Model Y recorded the highest overall safety score of any vehicle tested by ANCAP in 2025. The Tesla Model 3 also delivered strong results, reinforcing the automaker’s safety leadership in Australia and New Zealand.
According to ANCAP in a press release, the Tesla Model Y achieved the highest overall weighted score of any vehicle assessed in 2025. ANCAP’s 2025 tests evaluated vehicles across four key pillars: Adult Occupant Protection, Child Occupant Protection, Vulnerable Road User Protection, and Safety Assist technologies.
The Model Y posted consistently strong results in all four categories, distinguishing itself through a system-based safety approach that combines structural crash protection with advanced driver-assistance features such as autonomous emergency braking, lane support, and driver monitoring.
This marked the second time the Model Y has topped ANCAP’s annual safety rankings. The Model Y’s previous version was also ANCAP’s top performer in 2022.
The Tesla Model 3 also delivered a strong performance in ANCAP’s 2025 tests, contributing to Tesla’s broader safety presence across segments. Similar to the Model Y, the Model 3 also earned impressive scores across the ANCAP’s four pillars. This made the vehicle the top performer in the Medium Car category.
ANCAP Chief Executive Officer Carla Hoorweg stated that the results highlight a growing industry shift toward integrated safety design, with improvements in technologies such as autonomous emergency braking and lane support translating into meaningful real-world protection.
“ANCAP’s testing continues to reinforce a clear message: the safest vehicles are those designed with safety as a system, not a checklist. The top performers this year delivered consistent results across physical crash protection, crash avoidance and vulnerable road user safety, rather than relying on strength in a single area.
“We are also seeing increasing alignment between ANCAP’s test requirements and the safety technologies that genuinely matter on Australian and New Zealand roads. Improvements in autonomous emergency braking, lane support, and driver monitoring systems are translating into more robust protection,” Hoorweg said.
News
Tesla Sweden uses Megapack battery to bypass unions’ Supercharger blockade
Just before Christmas, Tesla went live with a new charging station in Arlandastad, outside Stockholm, by powering it with a Tesla Megapack battery.
Tesla Sweden has successfully launched a new Supercharger station despite an ongoing blockade by Swedish unions, using on-site Megapack batteries instead of traditional grid connections. The workaround has allowed the Supercharger to operate without direct access to Sweden’s electricity network, which has been effectively frozen by labor action.
Tesla has experienced notable challenges connecting its new charging stations to Sweden’s power grid due to industrial action led by Seko, a major Swedish trade union, which has blocked all new electrical connections for new Superchargers. On paper, this made the opening of new Supercharger sites almost impossible.
Despite the blockade, Tesla has continued to bring stations online. In Malmö and Södertälje, new Supercharger locations opened after grid operators E.ON and Telge Nät activated the sites. The operators later stated that the connections had been made in error.
More recently, however, Tesla adopted a different strategy altogether. Just before Christmas, Tesla went live with a new charging station in Arlandastad, outside Stockholm, by powering it with a Tesla Megapack battery, as noted in a Dagens Arbete (DA) report.
Because the Supercharger station does not rely on a permanent grid connection, Tesla was able to bypass the blocked application process, as noted by Swedish car journalist and YouTuber Peter Esse. He noted that the Arlandastad Supercharger is likely dependent on nearby companies to recharge the batteries, likely through private arrangements.
Eight new charging stalls have been launched in the Arlandastad site so far, which is a fraction of the originally planned 40 chargers for the location. Still, the fact that Tesla Sweden was able to work around the unions’ efforts once more is impressive, especially since Superchargers are used even by non-Tesla EVs.
Esse noted that Tesla’s Megapack workaround is not as easily replicated in other locations. Arlandastad is unique because neighboring operators already have access to grid power, making it possible for Tesla to source electricity indirectly. Still, Esse noted that the unions’ blockades have not affected sales as much.
“Many want Tesla to lose sales due to the union blockades. But you have to remember that sales are falling from 2024, when Tesla sold a record number of cars in Sweden. That year, the unions also had blockades against Tesla. So for Tesla as a charging operator, it is devastating. But for Tesla as a car company, it does not matter in terms of sales volumes. People charge their cars where there is an opportunity, usually at home,” Esse noted.
Elon Musk
Elon Musk’s X goes down as users report major outage Friday morning
Error messages and stalled loading screens quickly spread across the service, while outage trackers recorded a sharp spike in user reports.
Elon Musk’s X experienced an outage Friday morning, leaving large numbers of users unable to access the social media platform.
Error messages and stalled loading screens quickly spread across the service, while outage trackers recorded a sharp spike in user reports.
Downdetector reports
Users attempting to open X were met with messages such as “Something went wrong. Try reloading,” often followed by an endless spinning icon that prevented access, according to a report from Variety. Downdetector data showed that reports of problems surged rapidly throughout the morning.
As of 10:52 a.m. ET, more than 100,000 users had reported issues with X. The data indicated that 56% of complaints were tied to the mobile app, while 33% were related to the website and roughly 10% cited server connection problems. The disruption appeared to begin around 10:10 a.m. ET, briefly eased around 10:35 a.m., and then returned minutes later.
Previous disruptions
Friday’s outage was not an isolated incident. X has experienced multiple high-profile service interruptions over the past two years. In November, tens of thousands of users reported widespread errors, including “Internal server error / Error code 500” messages. Cloudflare-related error messages were also reported.
In March 2025, the platform endured several brief outages spanning roughly 45 minutes, with more than 21,000 reports in the U.S. and 10,800 in the U.K., according to Downdetector. Earlier disruptions included an outage in August 2024 and impairments to key platform features in July 2023.
Tesla Model Y and Model 3 named safest vehicles tested by ANCAP in 2025
Tesla Sweden uses Megapack battery to bypass unions’ Supercharger blockade
