During the sixth test flight of Starship, viewers not only witnessed the extraordinary power of technology but also encountered a peculiar sight: a banana (believed to be a full-size model rather than a real banana) floating in the spacecraft’s cabin.
A banana floating in the Starship cabin.
This image immediately raised the question: were SpaceX engineers “playing around” by sending a banana into space?
In reality, this banana is not a joke but serves a genuine scientific purpose. It was used as a weightless state indicator, helping the team confirm that the spacecraft had achieved microgravity conditions while orbiting Earth.
Kate Tice, the quality engineering manager at SpaceX, explained: “Bananas have long been used as a quick reference standard. We thought it was time to bring this fruit onto Starship.” Not stopping there, the SpaceX team also attached a banana sticker to the exterior of the rocket as a humorous way to emphasize the massive size of the spacecraft.
