SpaceX's Starship rocket on Tuesday deployed its first batch of mock Starlink satellites in space and tested new heat shield tiles on its plunge through Earth's atmosphere, clinching development milestones that had been held up by a streak of previous testing failures.

SpaceX on Tuesday night launched the 10th test flight of its giant Super Heavy-Starship rocket, a milestone mission to demonstrate fixes and upgrades in the wake of three catastrophic failures earlier this year.