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On December 11, 2024, Stoke Space successfully hotfired its Zenith first-stage engine vertically at its Moses Lake, Washington, test site. The test brought together a flight-layout engine, a new purpose-built stand and a demanding full-flow staged-combustion design—a meaningful step toward the company’s Nova rocket, but not proof that the engine had completed qualification or that Nova was ready to fly.
What Stoke tested in Moses Lake
The test took place at Stoke Space’s private Moses Lake Test Site. The hardware was the Block 2 flight-layout version of Zenith, the engine Stoke is developing for Nova’s first stage. Stoke described the burn as clean and an important team milestone; GeekWire reported that the engine was mounted vertically on the new stand. The hotfire duration was not disclosed, so the event is best understood as a development test rather than a demonstrated full-duration run. GeekWire’s account of the test
Stoke’s current Nova specifications list liquefied natural gas and liquid oxygen (LNG/LOX) as the first-stage propellants, more than 100,000 pounds-force of intended Zenith thrust, and a Stage 1 specific impulse of 345 seconds. Those are public design specifications, not measurements disclosed for the December burn. Stoke’s Nova overview
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A horizontal hotfire can provide valuable engine data; vertical testing does not make other orientations invalid. It does, however, let engineers study a configuration closer to launch. Gravity and orientation can affect how propellants reach the engine, as well as drainage, thermal behavior, hardware loads and interfaces. Test teams can also examine start-up and shutdown transients and instrumentation in a more flight-representative arrangement.
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Stoke says its Moses Lake vertical stand is intended to support full-thrust, full-duration engine qualification in the orientation the engines will use in flight. That describes the stand’s purpose, not what the December 2024 test achieved: the public account did not disclose the burn’s duration or establish that Zenith had completed qualification. Stoke’s description of the Moses Lake site
What makes Zenith’s engine cycle demanding
Zenith uses full-flow staged combustion (FFSC). In a staged-combustion engine, preburners produce hot gas that drives turbines powering the propellant pumps; that gas then enters the main combustion chamber. In a full-flow arrangement, separate fuel-rich and oxidizer-rich streams each pass through their own turbine before entering the chamber.
The approach has the potential to combine high performance with characteristics useful for a reusable engine, including high chamber pressure. But it adds difficult engineering work: two hot-gas paths, complex turbomachinery and seals, demanding materials, precise control, and challenging ignition and shutdown sequences. LNG is a hydrocarbon fuel; it can offer useful density and handling properties, but it does not match hydrogen’s specific impulse. The engine’s cycle and propellants are part of a broader vehicle design, not a guarantee of reusability or low operating costs.
When the December test was reported, Stoke and GeekWire characterized Stoke and SpaceX as the only organizations to have successfully developed FFSC engines. That is a time-bound, attributed description of a narrowly defined technical achievement—not a permanent ranking of every engine program. Stoke’s announcement of its earlier FFSC engine hotfire
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What the hotfire did—and did not—demonstrate
A successful hotfire shows that an engine ignited and operated in a ground-test setting. It is one stage in a longer evidence chain:
- Development testing: gather data, find problems and refine hardware.
- Qualification: show that a design meets required performance, margins and duration criteria.
- Flight acceptance: clear a specific engine for a particular mission.
- Orbital flight: demonstrate the complete vehicle under launch conditions.
- Reusable operations: recover, inspect and fly hardware again at an acceptable level of reliability and turnaround.
The December event belongs in the first category. It did not, by itself, establish full-duration qualification, repeated-start capability, orbital readiness, launch reliability or operational reusability. A ground stand also cannot reproduce every flight condition, including the vehicle’s acceleration, aerodynamic loads, staging and complete thermal environment.
Further engine and vehicle work would need to establish stable operation across the required throttle range, reliable starts and shutdowns, durability of turbines and preburners, chamber and cooling-system life, mission-representative duty cycles, behavior under off-nominal conditions, and integration with stage structures, tanks, avionics and launch software. Reusability adds recovery, inspection and refurbishment questions. The December test report does not say which of these questions the burn answered.
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Why the stand matters beyond one engine test
The Moses Lake site gives Stoke a local facility for repeated propulsion and component work rather than a single-purpose place to hold one demonstration. Stoke describes multiple engine stands, component test bays, cryogenic testing, flight-software integration and extensive instrumentation at the site. It says Moses Lake is about a three-hour drive from its vertically integrated design and manufacturing facility in Kent, Washington. Stoke’s locations overview
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That infrastructure can support quicker cycles between design, manufacturing and test, and give the company greater control over test scheduling. Stoke’s “test like you fly” philosophy means using representative hardware and conditions where practical; it is a development approach, not a claim that a ground test duplicates flight.
How the December milestone fits into Nova’s development
Zenith is one part of Nova, which Stoke describes as a fully and rapidly reusable medium-lift launch vehicle. The company’s architecture pairs the LNG/LOX first-stage engine with Andromeda, a hydrogen-fueled engine for the reusable upper stage. The December hotfire addressed first-stage propulsion; it was not a test of the complete rocket. Stoke’s Nova overview
The development sequence leading to it included a vertical takeoff and landing flight of a reusable upper-stage prototype in September 2023, followed by an initial FFSC first-stage engine hotfire in June 2024. Stoke said that June test reached its target starting power level in less than one second, describing that level as roughly 350,000 horsepower. That was an earlier test and should not be confused with the December Block 2 flight-layout engine hotfire. Stoke’s June 2024 hotfire announcement
What happened after the 2024 test
Later announcements show continued development, not that the December test alone qualified Nova. In January 2025, Stoke announced a $260 million Series C round, linking the investment to Nova development, manufacturing, test-facility improvements and work at Launch Complex 14 in Florida. Stoke’s Series C announcement
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In March 2025, the company was selected for the U.S. Space Force’s National Security Space Launch Phase 3 Lane 1 program. The selection is a procurement-program milestone, not evidence that Nova had launched or was already providing operational service. Stoke’s press releases
In October 2025, Stoke announced $510 million in Series D financing and a $100 million debt facility. It also reported completing mission-duty-cycle testing on Stage 1 and Stage 2 flight-like engine configurations and advancing structural qualification. These are company-reported later milestones; they do not retroactively establish what the December 2024 test demonstrated. Stoke’s Series D and development update
Stoke’s public materials describe Launch Complex 14 activation as scheduled for early 2026. That is the company’s stated schedule, not confirmation here that the site became operational on that date. Stoke Space
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