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LIVE FROM THE EMPIRE · SEPTEMBER 29, 2026
Starship reached orbit. First try.
Flight 14 lifted off at 7:48 a.m. CT, entered orbit on the first attempt, and deployed all 26 Starlink V3 satellites. One engine quit early on the way up. The team still went for insertion. Splashdown confirmed after a shortened mission. History happened yesterday.
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ORBIT
Achieved
First Starship orbital flight.
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PAYLOAD
26 V3s
All deployed. Contact confirmed.
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SPLASHDOWN
Confirmed
Pacific, after ~3 hours.
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MUSK WEALTH TRACKER
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FORBES REAL-TIME · LATEST
~$908B
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#1 in the world
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Musk remains number one. A successful first orbital Starship flight only strengthens the case for SpaceX as the dominant piece of the number.
Source: Forbes Real-Time Billionaires data as of mid-September 2026. Figures move with markets.
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ACROSS THE EMPIRE
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Orbit on the first try
Starship Flight 14 lifted off from Starbase at 7:48 a.m. CT. After hot-staging, the flight control team assessed the ship, cleared the orbital insertion burn, and Ship 41 entered low Earth orbit near 275 km — the first time any Starship has done so.
Why this matters: Thirteen previous flights stayed intentionally suborbital. Orbit is the line that turns a test vehicle into a system that can stay up, deploy payload, and come home on command.
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All 26 Starlink V3s deployed
After a brief coast, Starship released every one of the 26 Starlink V3 satellites. Contact was made with all of them over laser links, ground stations, and user terminals. Three of the satellites carried cameras to image the heat shield.
Why this matters: This is the first operational payload deployment from Starship. Each V3 adds roughly 1 Tbps of capacity. The flight proved the vehicle can put real network hardware into service.
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One engine down, still go
One of Ship 41’s Raptor engines shut down early during ascent. The team still judged the remaining engines healthy enough for the insertion burn and proceeded. The planned six-orbit, roughly 10-hour mission was later shortened to about three hours.
Why this matters: Redundancy worked. The vehicle reached orbit and completed its primary objectives despite an early engine loss. That is how operational systems are supposed to behave.
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Splashdown confirmed
Starship completed its first deorbit burn, survived reentry, executed the landing flip and burn, and splashed down in the Pacific. The Super Heavy booster made a controlled splashdown in the Gulf of Mexico. SpaceX congratulated the team on the first orbital flight.
Why this matters: Getting to orbit is only half the job. Coming home under control closes the loop. Both stages completed their recovery profiles.
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Grok tops cyber rankings
Grok 4.7 xHigh ranked number one on the Artificial Analysis Cyber Index, ahead of several leading models. Elon replied: “Not bad.” Team Bots also launched — shared AI teammates that learn as a group works with them in Slack or Grok Bot.
Why this matters: Cyber defense is a high-stakes domain. Ranking first there, while the same model family is already doing real engineering work, shows breadth as well as peak performance.
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THE MAIN EVENT
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FIRST ORBIT
Starship left the atmosphere, stayed up, and put real satellites to work.
I watched the feed yesterday morning. At 7:48 a.m. Central, Flight 14 left the pad. Hot-staging looked clean. Then one of Ship 41’s engines shut down early. For a moment the path to orbit was in question. The team assessed the remaining engines, called them healthy enough, and went for the insertion burn anyway.
Ship 41 entered low Earth orbit. It deployed all 26 Starlink V3 satellites. Contact was confirmed with every one of them. The planned six-orbit, ten-hour profile was shortened to roughly three hours. The deorbit burn worked. Reentry worked. The landing flip and burn worked. Splashdown was confirmed in the Pacific. The booster had already made a controlled splashdown in the Gulf.
SpaceX’s own summary was direct: Starship achieved orbit on its first attempt and successfully delivered Starlink V3 satellites to space for the first time. Thirteen flights stayed suborbital on purpose. The fourteenth crossed the line.
My take: Orbit plus real payload is the difference between a test article and a system. One engine failed and the mission still completed its core objectives. That is the kind of resilience that turns a rocket into infrastructure. Yesterday Starship stopped being only a demonstrator.
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ELON ON X
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CYBER
“Not bad”
On Grok 4.7 ranking number one in the Artificial Analysis Cyber Index.
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TEAM
“Now @Bot works as a team!”
On the launch of Team Bots — shared AI teammates that learn as a group works with them.
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INFRASTRUCTURE
“SpaceX is building massive infrastructure for the future”
Amplifying a SpaceX post on supercomputers, Terafab, Gigasat, and a new Starbase in Louisiana.
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THE TROLL REPORT
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🧌 “They cut the mission short, so it failed.”
Orbit was achieved. All 26 satellites were deployed and contacted. Deorbit and splashdown succeeded. Primary objectives were met. Shortening the coast after that is not the same as failure.
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🧌 “One engine failed, so the vehicle is not ready.”
One engine failed and the remaining ones still put the ship into orbit and completed the mission. That is exactly the kind of redundancy an operational system needs. The data from that event is now in the engineering loop.
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“Starship achieved orbit on its first attempt and successfully delivered Starlink V3 satellites to space for the first time.”
— SpaceX, September 28, 2026
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Orbit achieved. Satellites deployed. Splashdown confirmed.
Forward this to the person still waiting for Starship to leave the test phase.
READ ÆLON DAILY
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Sources: SpaceX Flight 14 official updates (orbit, payload deploy, splashdown) · Mission timeline and engine anomaly reports · Grok cyber ranking and Team Bots launch · Elon Musk posts · Forbes Real-Time data. Claims can evolve after publication.
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