India, July 24 -- SpaceX is set to attempt the 13th test flight of its Starship rocket on Friday from its Starbase facility in south Texas, with the launch window opening at 5.45pm local time (04.15am IST Saturday) - after two setbacks in a week that pushed back what should have been a milestone for the company.

Thursday's attempt was scrubbed and moved by a day because of unfavourable weather. That in turn followed a last-second abort on July 16, when the automatic launch system halted the countdown seconds before liftoff after some of the 33 Raptor engines on the Super Heavy booster failed to fire. On-screen data from the SpaceX webcast showed four engines had not ignited. Two engines were to be swapped out, with SpaceX chief executive...