A camera mounted in Starship's payload bay revealed the toy banana held by cables tied to its top and bottom. More than just a visual signal that Starship had reached space on its suborbital trajectory, the banana was also a stand-in for gaining the government's approval to begin launching more purposeful payloads on future Starship flights.

SpaceX launched the sixth test flight of its Starship rocket on Tuesday, as the company looks to keep up momentum of the mammoth vehicle’s development.

Elon Musk's SpaceX launched its giant Starship rocket to space from Texas on Tuesday, advancing the ship's spaceflight abilities but botching an attempt to bring its booster back to land as U.S. President-elect Donald Trump watched from the company's rocket facilities.