Starbase, Texas

Starbase, formerly Boca Chica Village or Kopernik Shores, is a city in Cameron County, Texas, United States, near the mouth of the Rio Grande. It lies 20 miles (32 km) east of the City of Brownsville on the Boca Chica peninsula, and forms part of the Brownsville–Harlingen–Raymondville and the Matamoros–Brownsville metropolitan areas. It is situated on State Highway 4, (SH 4, Boca Chica Boulevard), immediately south of the South Bay lagoon, and is located about 2 mi (3.2 km) north of the mouth of the Rio Grande. The population was 500 as of 2025.

The town was initially formed in the late 1960s, and has changed greatly since 2018 as SpaceX came to purchase many of the properties in the village. Numerous construction projects are underway including a community center, school, clinic, and additional housing. In 2014, the village was chosen as the location for the construction of a control facility for the SpaceX South Texas launch site, while the launch site itself was slated to be built just 2 miles (3.2 km) farther east, adjacent to Boca Chica State Park on the Texas Gulf Coast. Flight testing—and even more frequent ground testing—of prototype rocket vehicles and rocket engines began in 2019 and have continued into 2025.

In March 2021, SpaceX CEO Elon Musk announced plans to incorporate a new city to be called Starbase in the area. The city was planned to include the existing Boca Chica Village, the SpaceX test site and launch site, and more of the surrounding Boca Chica area. SpaceX submitted a petition in 2024 to Cameron County to formally incorporate the city of Starbase, which voters approved on May 3, 2025, through a municipal ballot measure. Formal incorporation occurred on May 20, 2025, with Bobby Peden, a SpaceX vice-president, serving as mayor. Peden ran unopposed, as did two other residents with SpaceX ties who fill the two commissioner seats.

In 1967, the settlement was founded as Kennedy Shores by John Caputa, a Chicagoan property developer, and was initially aimed at working-class Polish migrants.

After building a community of about 30 ranch-style houses, the settlement was devastated by Hurricane Beulah later in 1967, which destroyed the restaurant and public utility systems. Electricity was restored, but many of the homes did not have potable water even decades later.

In 1975, local resident Stanley Piotrowicz was voted in as town "mayor"; he renamed the village Kopernik Shores after Nicolaus Copernicus, and attempted to have the village recognized as an incorporated community, but this was denied by the state government. In 1990 and 2000, the population was 26 people.

Although the name Kopernik Shores is no longer in popular use, it was still used occasionally in official contexts per the U.S. Board on Geographic Names as late as 2025.

As of 2008, only six people were permanent residents of the village, which was dubbed a "ghost town".