[2][3] Starship successfully completed a full-duration second stage burn, reaching the intended orbital velocity for the first time, but broke up during re-entry in the atmosphere.

[3][4][5] After the second flight test in November 2023 ended in the destruction of both the Super Heavy booster and the Starship spacecraft, 17 significant changes were made to the vehicles, including upgrading the ship to an electric thrust vector control (TVC) system[6][7] (the booster had received similar upgrades for the second flight test[8]) and delaying the vent of liquid oxygen (LOX) to after Starship engine cutoff (SECO).

[6] SpaceX upgraded the orbital tank farm with additional subcoolers and pumps to increase the propellant flow rate.

In the mishap report, SpaceX identified 17 corrective actions, of which ten were for the Starship upper stage and seven for the Super Heavy booster.

[18] Starship flight test 3 launched from the SpaceX Starbase facility along the South Texas coast around 8:25 CDT.

It attempted to re-enter the atmosphere over the Indian Ocean, and at an altitude of around 65 km, all telemetry from Ship 28 stopped, indicating a loss of the vehicle.

[26] The agency's associate administrator for commercial space transportation, Kelvin Coleman, said on March 18 that he did not anticipate any major issues that could delay the investigation.

[28] On April 5, SpaceX requested that the FAA agree that the third flight test mishap did not present a public safety issue.

[29] On May 11, SpaceX founder and CEO Elon Musk stated that the fourth Starship launch could occur in 3-5 weeks, bringing the date forward to early-mid June.

According to SpaceX, several minutes after the ship engine cutoff (SECO), the valves responsible for the roll control thrusters were clogged.

In order to mitigate these issues, SpaceX has implemented hardware changes to the booster liquid oxygen tank to improve propellant filtration.