Boca Chica (Texas)

Boca Chica
Location	Cameron County, Texas, United States
Nearest city	Brownsville
Coordinates	25°59′49″N 97°9′6″W / 25.99694°N 97.15167°W / 25.99694; -97.15167

Boca Chica is an area on the eastern portion of a subdelta peninsula of Cameron County, at the far south of the US State of Texas along the Gulf Coast. It is bordered by the Brownsville Ship Channel to the north, the Rio Grande and Mexico to the south, and the Gulf of Mexico to the east. The area extends about 25 miles (40 km) east of the city of Brownsville. The peninsula is served by Texas State Highway 4—also known as the Boca Chica Highway, or Boca Chica Boulevard within Brownsville city limits—which runs east–west, terminating at the Gulf and Boca Chica Beach.

The Boca Chica area has seen various developments over the course of its history. These include Mexican land grants, Mexican and American ranches, a battlefield of the American Civil War, a 1920s beach resort, and a state park (Boca Chica State Park);^[1] additionally, a small settlement named Boca Chica Village existed in the area from 1960 to 2020. In recent years, the area has become more widely known due to being the site of Starbase, a major facility of aerospace company SpaceX for the development, manufacturing and testing of its rockets.^[2] Starbase is envisioned to one day serve as the primary launch and recovery facility for SpaceX's Starship launch vehicle.

Boca Chica means "small mouth of the river" in Spanish, as the Rio Grande's flow is modest, and in droughts, the mouth of the river may disappear altogether.^[3]