Nearly two months after a fiery explosion showered debris over the Turks and Caicos Islands, SpaceX launched another colossal Starship rocket on Thursday, only to lose contact shortly after, causing the spacecraft to descend uncontrollably and break apart.
This time, the remnants of the disintegration were observed cascading from the skies over Florida. There was no immediate confirmation on whether the spacecraft’s self-destruct mechanism had been activated to cause the explosion. The 403-foot (123-meter) rocket lifted off from a site in Texas. While SpaceX successfully recovered the first-stage booster using giant mechanical arms back at the launch pad, the engines on the upper section of the rocket began to shut down as it traveled eastward. This phase was intended to culminate in a controlled descent over the Indian Ocean, halfway around the globe. However, communication was severed less than 10 minutes into the flight as the spacecraft spiraled out of control.
Before the complications arose, Starship reached an altitude near 90 miles (150 kilometers), unable to deploy the four mock satellites it carried. It was unclear exactly where the rocket re-entered, but imagery of flaming debris was captured over parts of Florida, including the vicinity of Cape Canaveral, and subsequently shared online.
The mission was designed to be a brief foray into space, lasting around an hour. In light of the incident, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) announced that it would mandate an investigation by SpaceX into the mishap. “Unfortunately, this happened last time too, so we have some practice at this now,” quipped SpaceX flight commentator Dan Huot from the launch site.
SpaceX later verified that the spacecraft underwent a “rapid unscheduled disassembly” during the ascent engine ignition and confirmed that it had promptly informed safety authorities. The incident led to a temporary halt in flights at Orlando International Airport, attributed to space launch debris in the vicinity as shared by the airport.
This test flight did not reach the same altitude or duration as the previous attempt. NASA has committed the Starship for the historic task of landing astronauts on the moon later in this decade, while SpaceX’s Elon Musk has set his sights on using Starship for Mars missions, as it represents the largest and most powerful rocket constructed.
Much like previous demonstrations, this latest Starship carried mock satellites to release upon reaching space, serving as a rehearsal for imminent missions. These simulated payloads were similar in appearance to SpaceX’s Starlink internet satellites, thousands of which currently orbit Earth and were designed to fall back to Earth after a brief excursion into space.
Ahead of this attempt, Starship had undergone enhancements to its flaps, control systems, and fuel mechanisms in preparation for a key milestone: re-acquiring the spacecraft at the launch site just as it did the booster. In previous tests, after successfully recovering the booster, the spacecraft exploded some minutes later over the Atlantic Ocean, with no injuries or significant property damage reported.
The root cause of the prior failure, still under investigation, relates to fuel leakage that ignited fires leading to the shutdown of the spacecraft’s engines. The self-destruct sequence on board responded as intended. Following the last incident, SpaceX implemented various upgrades to the spacecraft, and the FAA recently provided clearance for Starship to be launched again.
SpaceX’s Starship program operates from the southernmost tip of Texas, near the border with Mexico. In addition, SpaceX is developing another launch complex at Cape Canaveral, which also serves as a launch site for their smaller Falcon rockets that transport astronauts and satellites into orbit.
