Technologies

SpaceX Calls Mission 3 a Success, Despite Losing Starship: How to Rewatch

On its third attempt, SpaceX launched its Starship and cruised into space, but lost the rocket after reentry to Earth.

SpaceX launched its third Starship mission on Thursday, with the space exploration company owned by Elon Musk forging ahead after the first two attempts exploded after takeoff. SpaceX considers those first two missions successful, thanks to the data it was able to collect, and the third mission was the most successful of the bunch.

Shortly before 9:30 a.m. ET Thursday, the company posted three words to the Musk-owned X social media site: «Liftoff of Starship!» A 36-second video showed the rocket engines igniting and then Starship rising amid a cloud of exhaust smoke and up into the sky.

But the rocket did not complete the round trip, as you can see by rewatching the full test flight. «The ship has been lost. No splashdown today,» Dan Huot of SpaceX communications said on the stream. «But we were able to get through some of the early phases of reentry.»

SpaceX quality engineering manager Kate Tice noted on the stream that SpaceX wasn’t intending to recover Starship anyway, and had been planning to crash it into the ocean.

Starship is arguably the most ambitious effort for Musk, who owns the satellite-based internet company Starlink along with X, EV maker Tesla and the neurotechnology company Neuralink. The Starship missions are critical to SpaceX’s — and Musk’s — goal of getting to and eventually settling the moon and Mars.

With a new flight trajectory and hopes for new data insights, the space company’s third mission may prove to be its most important yet.

When did the Starship mission launch?

Starship’s third mission launched on March 14. It had been pending favorable weather and a license from the Federal Aviation Administration.

How to rewatch Starship mission 3

SpaceX set up livestreams for watching the third mission. One was the SpaceX account on X, and another was the SpaceX third mission landing page. You could also watch via CNET’s YouTube channel.

You can rewatch the launch on X, on the mission 3 page, or via CNET’s YouTube stream embedded here.

What SpaceX achieved in Starship mission 3

SpaceX’s third Starship mission was designed to test whether the spacecraft can complete certain tasks. After liftoff, the company planned to open Starship’s payload door and transfer its propellant from one part of the vehicle to another. For the first time, SpaceX also attempted to relight its Raptor engine while in space, a test that could be critical for future missions as it eventually tries to propel Starship through space.

Starship took a different flight path this time around, and had planned to land in the Indian Ocean instead of the Pacific Ocean until it lost the vehicle after reentry. In a statement, SpaceX said that the new flight path was designed to maximize «public safety,» but the company didn’t discuss how.

The new flight path also paved the way for SpaceX to try «in-space engine burns,» a reference to the company attempting to reignite the Raptor engine in space.

«Huge congratulations to the entire team for this incredible day: clean count (glad the shrimpers could get out in the nick of time!), liftoff, hot staging, Super Heavy boost back and coast (and likely a couple engines making mainstage during landing burn!), clean ship ‘insertion’ and coast, payload door cycling and prop transfer demo (to be confirmed!), and ship entry!» SpaceX President Gwynne Shotwell posted on X following the launch, naming the successful components of the test.

The mission was slated to last for 1 hour, 15 minutes. Previous missions, if completed, would have lasted 90 minutes.

What happened in the previous missions?

April mission: Forced detonation

The first Starship mission launched in April 2023. Early on in the mission, the two stages of Starship — the reusable upper stage, called Starship, and its Super Heavy first-stage booster — were supposed to separate. That didn’t happen, and for safety reasons, the SpaceX team was forced to detonate the vehicle just 4 minutes into the mission.

November mission: Explosion due to liquid oxygen

In November 2023, Starship launched on its second mission. That time around, Starship was able to separate its two stages and it reached nominal first-stage engine burn. However, Starship exploded 8 minutes after launch when it tried to vent its liquid oxygen. Oddly, the explosion may not have needed to happen. Earlier this year, Musk said on a real mission carrying payload — meaning the materials a spaceship carries to perform its scientific mission — liquid oxygen wouldn’t be onboard.

«Starship’s second flight test achieved a number of major milestones and provided invaluable data to continue rapidly developing Starship,» the company wrote on its site. «Each of these flight tests continue to be just that: a test. They aren’t occurring in a lab or on a test stand, but are putting flight hardware in a flight environment to maximize learning.»

Corinne Reichert contributed to this report.

Technologies

Meta Is Shutting Down Its Mac and Windows Messenger Apps. What You Need to Know

Here’s what you need to do before the apps disappear at the end of the year.

If you use the desktop Messenger apps for Windows and Mac, you need to know that they’re disappearing soon. Meta is discontinuing the apps starting Dec. 15, when you’ll need to head to Facebook to continue chatting through the app on your computer.

Once the sundowning process begins, you’ll receive an in-app notification. You’ll have a 60-day window to continue using Messenger before the app is permanently shut down. (But don’t worry — the mobile app for Messenger will remain.)

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If you want to save your chat history, Meta suggests activating secure storage before the app is gone forever. Otherwise, your chat history will be gone forever, as well.

The Messenger desktop app is no longer available on the Apple App Store. After Dec. 15, Meta users who try to access Messenger on desktop will be redirected to Facebook.com. Users without a Facebook account will be redirected to Messenger.com.

Technologies

This New Humanoid Home Robot Costs $20K, and You Still Have to Train It

The Neo robot from 1X is designed to do household chores, but it’s got a lot of learning still to do.

It stands 5 feet, 6 inches tall, weighs about as much as a golden retriever and costs near the price of a brand-new budget car.

This is Neo, the humanoid robot. It’s billed as a personal assistant you can talk to and eventually rely on to take care of everyday tasks, such as loading the dishwasher and folding laundry.

Neo doesn’t work cheap. It’ll cost you $20,000. And even then, you’ll still have to train this new home bot.

If that sounds enticing, preorders are now open (for a mere $200 down). You’ll be signing up as an early adopter for what Neo’s maker, a California-based company called 1X, is calling a «consumer-ready humanoid.» That’s opposed to other humanoids under development from the likes of Tesla and Figure, which are, for the moment at least, more focused on factory environments.

Neo is a whole order of magnitude different from robot vacuums like those from Roomba, Eufy and Ecovacs, and embodies a long-running sci-fi fantasy of robot maids and butlers doing chores and picking up after us. If this is the future, read on for more of what’s in store.

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What the Neo robot can do around the house

The pitch from 1X is that Neo can do all manner of household chores: fold laundry, run a vacuum, tidy shelves, bring in the groceries. It can open doors, climb stairs and even act as a home entertainment system.

Neo appears to move smoothly, with a soft, almost human-like gait, thanks to 1X’s tendon-driven motor system that gives it gentle motion and impressive strength. The company says it can lift up to 154 pounds and carry 55 pounds, but it is quieter than a refrigerator. It’s covered in soft materials and neutral colors, making it look less intimidating than metallic prototypes from other companies.

The company says Neo has a 4-hour runtime. Its hands are IP68-rated, meaning they’re submersible in water. It can connect via Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and 5G. For conversation, it has a built-in LLM, the same sort of AI technology that powers ChatGPT and Gemini.

The primary way to control the Neo robot will be by speaking to it, just as if it were a person in your home.

Still, Neo’s usefulness today depends heavily on how you define useful. The Wall Street Journal’s Joanna Stern got an up-close look at Neo at 1X’s headquarters and found that, at least for now, it’s largely teleoperated, meaning a human often operates it remotely using a virtual-reality headset and controllers.

«I didn’t see Neo do anything autonomously, although the company did share a video of Neo opening a door on its own,» Stern wrote.

1X CEO Bernt Børnich told her that Neo will do most things autonomously in 2026, though he also acknowledged that the quality «may lag at first.»

What you need to know about Neo and privacy

Part of what early adopters are signing up for is to let Neo learn from their environment so that future versions can operate more independently.

That learning process raises privacy and trust questions. The robot uses a mix of visual, audio and contextual intelligence — meaning it can see, hear and remember interactions with users throughout their homes.

«If you buy this product, it is because you’re OK with that social contract,» Børnich told the Journal. «It’s less about Neo instantly doing your chores and more about you helping Neo learn to do them safely and effectively.»

1X says it’s taking steps to protect your privacy: Neo listens only when it recognizes it’s being addressed, and its cameras will blur out humans. You can restrict Neo from entering or viewing specific areas of your home, and the robot will never be teleoperated without owner approval, the company says.

But inviting an AI-equipped humanoid to observe your home life isn’t a small step.

The first units will ship to customers in the US in 2026. There is a $499 monthly subscription alternative to the $20,000 full-purchase price, though that will be available at an unspecified later date. A broader international rollout is promised for 2027.

Neo’s got a long road ahead of it to live up to the expectations set by Rosie the Robot in The Jetsons way back when. But this is no Hanna-Barbera cartoon. What we’re seeing now is a much more tangible harbinger of change.