SpaceX launched its 15th Starship test flight Friday, sending the massive rocket skyward from the company’s South Texas launch facility. The rocket lifted off at 4:47 p.m. local time, or 5:47 p.m. ET.

The ambitious mission included plans to catch and reuse both stages of Starship. SpaceX ultimately abandoned its attempt to catch the booster and redirected it toward a splashdown in the Gulf of Mexico, where it burst into flames.

Test Flight 15 was the most ambitious Starship mission conducted by Elon Musk’s company to date. It marked the first time SpaceX attempted to catch both the booster and the upper stage, which is the spacecraft portion of the rocket.

Although the booster recovery effort ended unsuccessfully, the upper stage continued its trajectory into orbit. SpaceX expected the spacecraft to circle Earth 14 times before a planned landing attempt at the company’s Starbase facility on Saturday.

SpaceX received authorization for the flight from the Federal Aviation Administration earlier Friday. Hours later, the FAA issued a nationwide ground stop after reporting communication problems affecting “multiple” air traffic control centers.

The ground stop did not affect the SpaceX license, an FAA spokesperson told CNBC. That allowed the Starship test to proceed despite the broader aviation disruption reported by the agency.

Starship is critical to SpaceX’s ambitions to eventually transport cargo and people to the surfaces of the Moon and Mars. In the near term, the company also needs the rocket to place more Starlink satellites into orbit as it expands its satellite internet service.

Starlink is currently SpaceX’s profit center, according to the source report. The company’s satellite constellation already includes more than 11,000 active satellites operating in low Earth orbit.

SpaceX has said a single Starship rocket can carry as many as 60 Starlink v3 satellites into orbit. That represents about 20 times the carrying capacity of the company’s earlier Falcon 9 rockets.

During the previous Starship test flight, SpaceX released 26 v3 satellites. The company released another 26 during Friday’s mission, continuing an aggressive effort to increase the reach and capacity of the Starlink network.

SpaceX described the goal in a post on X as “Starlink becoming 51% of the internet,” reflecting the scale of the company’s stated ambitions for the service. The test flight therefore carried significance beyond the attempted rocket recoveries.

William Blair analysts said SpaceX retains a substantial advantage over other launch providers. “SpaceX is likely a full decade ahead of peers on this front,” the analysts wrote in a note released Friday.

The analysts also played down the potential effect of an unsuccessful catch attempt. “Even if tonight’s catch is unsuccessful, a delay by a few months is not that consequential.”

At the same time, SpaceX is facing criticism involving restrictions placed on its Starshield satellite internet service in Ukraine. Starshield uses Starlink technology and serves as the military tier of SpaceX’s satellite internet operation.

Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said earlier in the week that his country’s military forces had again experienced limits on Starshield without warning. Zelenskyy said those restrictions harmed Ukraine’s ability to defend against Russia’s ongoing aerial attacks.

Similar Starshield limits in Ukraine were temporarily imposed during the previous month. Some U.S. senators have condemned the restrictions and urged Congress to investigate SpaceX, adding political scrutiny as the company continues its high profile Starship testing program.