SpaceX’s Starship rocket reached Earth orbit for the first time, although the milestone was accompanied by a setback.

The company’s massive rocket launched from South Texas early Monday, with the initial stages of the flight going according to plan. However, shortly after the spacecraft’s upper stage separated, one of its six Raptor engines shut down.

Although Starship was capable of reaching orbit with one engine out, SpaceX initially called off the attempt before reversing course just minutes later. The rocket went on to reach orbit and successfully deployed 26 new Starlink satellites.

About 90 minutes into the flight, SpaceX opted to return the upper stage to Earth earlier than planned, rather than allowing it to remain in orbit for roughly nine hours as originally intended.

“Flight teams will deorbit Starship safely to our pre-cleared area of the Pacific Ocean after 3 hours in orbit,” the company wrote on X.

Reaching orbit marks a major milestone for SpaceX, potentially paving the way for regular commercial missions and bringing the company closer to its goal of making Starship fully reusable.

SpaceX CEO Elon Musk has made Starship central to the company’s long-term strategy, including plans to support NASA’s lunar missions and more ambitious projects such as deploying data-centre satellites in orbit.

Before the launch, SpaceX had planned for Starship’s upper stage to complete six orbits of Earth over about nine hours while deploying 26 third-generation Starlink satellites into the company’s internet constellation.

During Monday’s flight, the Ship stage successfully deployed all 26 V3 Starlink satellites and established connections with each of them. The upgraded satellites are expected to begin serving Starlink customers within the next few weeks.

The new-generation Starlink satellites are more powerful than the earlier versions SpaceX has used to build its constellation of more than 10,000 satellites.