Starship launch plan at Kennedy Space Center prompts environmental comments

SpaceX officials hope to soon launch and launch the massive 492-foot-tall Starship-Super Heavy rocket up to 44 times a year at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center.

But 40-year Titusville resident Susan Palma fears further development on the Cape risks further disrupting the natural water flow and salinity of the endangered Indian River Lagoon. She attended an environmental meeting Wednesday on the potential impacts of Starship, armed with a written statement warning of the dangers of hazardous materials and wildlife adversely affected by air, light and noise pollution.

“I moved to the river in 2011. And within three years, my waterfront went from a brackish, coastal waterfront to dead. It’s still dead. No grass. No plants. No more shovels,” said palm tree

Cape Canaveral:Is there a departure today? Next SpaceX, NASA, ULA rocket launch schedule in Florida

“It’s dead. It’s brown. It’s stinky. It’s cloudy and cloudy. And it’s been 10 years now. I’m actually thinking about leaving. If they’re going to start expanding the space center, and they’re not going to attention to the environment (effects), maybe I’ll leave,” she said.

On Wednesday, the Radisson Resort at the Port of Cape Canaveral hosted a pair of open houses on the potential environmental impacts of the Starship-Super Heavy. The Federal Aviation Administration is collecting comments on SpaceX’s plan to bring the mega-rocket system to pad 39A.

A collection of experts at the event fielded one-on-one questions at eight poster-anchored stations inside a conference room. The FAA is the lead agency in the environmental impact statement. Other participating federal agencies: NASA and the US Air Force, the Coast Guard, the US Fish and Wildlife Service, and the National Park Service.

On Thursday, the FAA will gather comments during a similar Starship-Super Heavy public meeting from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. at the Debus Conference Facility in the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex.

Then on Monday a virtual meeting will take place from 18:00 to 20:00 More details:

Expand the URL: https://us06web.zoom.us/j/89402979916
Zoom in on the meeting ID: 894 0297 9916
Optional call numbers: 833-928-4608, 833-928-4609 or 833-928-4610.

The virtual meeting will feature “an automated closed-caption presentation that describes the purpose of the scoping meetings, the project schedule, opportunities for public involvement, a summary of the Proposed Action and alternatives, and a summary of the environmental resource area,” the FAA reported.

In addition to the launch, SpaceX proposes to land Super Heavy boosters and Starships on pad 39A and on drone ships in the Atlantic Ocean; expend Super Heavy boosters in the Atlantic Ocean at least 5 nautical miles offshore; and spend Starships in the open ocean between 55 degrees south latitude and 55 degrees north latitude.

SpaceX officials want to build a Super Heavy capture tower on pad 39A, along with on-site facilities for fuel generation and storage, a cooling tower, air separation units and a deluge system, according to a fact sheet. FAA.

A 2019 NASA environmental assessment of future Starship-Super Heavy operations found that launches would not have a significant impact on the biological or physical environment at pad 39A.

SpaceX officials also hope to begin launching Starship-Super Heavy rockets by 2026 at the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. The Air Force is preparing a Starship environmental impact statement with NASA, the FAA and the Coast Guard.

Last week, crews loaded sections of a Starship launch tower onto a barge in Turn Basin at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center for delivery to SpaceX Starbase in Brownsville, Texas.

Rockledge resident Brad Whitmore attended the open house Wednesday afternoon. He lives in a historic 105-year-old house south of Cocoa Village — and said the loud vibrations from SpaceX Falcon 9 launches on southeast trajectories may have cracked plaster on his ceiling and walls over the past year. He said others are expressing similar structural concerns in his immediate lagoon-side neighborhood.

“(Launch frequency) is going to continue to increase a lot going forward. And there’s going to be incremental transition from what is primarily Falcon 9 to include more Falcon Heavies and big rockets like SLS, Starship, Blue Origin,” said he.

“Falcon 9s can go from ‘you can barely hear them’ to ‘they shake my house’ – and the windows in my house shake and shake, and the things on my desk shake and move,” he said.

For the latest news from the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station and NASA’s Kennedy Space Center, visit floridatoday.com/space.

Rick Neale is a space reporter at FLORIDA TODAY. Contact Neale atRneale@floridatoday.com. Twitter/X: @RickNeale1

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