In an unfortunate turn of events for Elon Musk’s SpaceX, their latest rocket to launch was destroyed in a fireball just ten minutes after takeoff.
SpaceX’s latest test flight proved to have more issues than anticipated and Musk has since spoken out on the latest incident.
On Thursday (January 16) its Starship rocket – thankfully holding no passengers – broke up over the Gulf of Mexico, reportedly causing commercial airlines to change routes to avoid falling debris.
The incident occurred just eight and a half minutes into the flight from Texas, after the spacecraft’s six engines began shutting down one by one during ascent.
After the rocket launch, its booster made its planned return to the ground and after momentarily hovering over the launchpad before being caught by two mechanical arms.
However, minutes later, SpaceX confirmed they had lost contact with the rocket.
A host on SpaceX’s livestream said: “At this point in time, we can confirm we did lose the ship. It looks like we lost contact a little under eight and a half minutes into the flight.”
Videos on social media showed burning debris from the rocket streaking across the sky, reportedly over the Turks and Caicos Islands.
SpaceX spokesman Dan Huot admitted the company had hoped for a more successful situation.
He said: “It was great to see a booster come down, but we are obviously bummed out about ship. It’s a flight test. It’s an experimental vehicle.”
After the incident, Musk took to Twitter and made it clear that he didn’t consider this more than a ‘bump in the road’.
He commented: “The booster flight was a success, the ship flight was 1/4 successful, hence cup being ~5/8 full.
“New ship forward flaps, higher thrust engines and tile adherence on ascent were tested.
“Improved heat shield performance was the only major thing that wasn’t tested, along with the “Pez” payload dispenser. Probably solved in next month’s launch.
“The 9 meter diameter version of Starship will probably fly ~10,000 times, so this is barely a bump in the road. Doesn’t change the likely date at which Mars becomes self-sufficient.”
On the SpaceX Twitter page, they explained they would be reviewing data from the flight test to better understand what went wrong.
The page reiterated that successes come from learning from the mistakes of the day.
However, the company did face ridicule when they called the destruction of the rocket an ‘rapid unscheduled disassembly’.
