Starship, Failed Test: A SpaceX rocket explodes in flight shortly after liftoff

It exploded 4 minutes into the flight. Starship by SpaceX: Spaceship Elon Muskaimed at the Moon and Mars, turned into a fireball shortly after liftoff from Starbase, SpaceX’s private spaceport in Boca Chica, Texas.

This was his first flight test, without a crew, with the Super Heavy launcher, the largest rocket ever built, 120 meters long and capable of carrying a hundred people and tons of cargo on board.

Musk himself had only given himself a 50% chance that the rocket would reach its goal of traveling around the world. However, his Twitter comments expressed satisfaction and described the flight as a success: “We learned a lot for the upcoming test, in a few months,” commented the American billionaire who founded and runs SpaceX.

In the control room, the flight engineers hugged and cheered as if they had achieved a goal. “With testing like this, success comes from what we learn, and today’s testing will help us improve Starship reliability as SpaceX strives to make life multiplanetary,” SpaceX explained on Twitter.

Even NASA congratulated SpaceX. director Bill Nelson He commented in a tweet, “Every great achievement in history requires a certain level of calculated risk, because great risks bring great results.” “We look forward to the next soft launch and beyond.”

The giant rocket took off flawlessly at 15.33 Italian time. SpaceX explained that the capsule of the spacecraft was supposed to separate from the rocket three minutes after the start of the flight, but the separation did not happen and the rocket exploded from the control center for safety reasons. After starting to spin, it could actually fall to the ground, causing damage.

Three days ago, the launch was delayed due to a technical issue. The test was used to verify the capability of the launch system, which includes the most powerful rocket ever built in the history of space exploration. The Starship will be used for the first lunar landing of the Artemis program and is also the vehicle that NASA has indicated to bring the first humans to Mars.