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SpaceX’s massive Starship spacecraft exploded in space on Thursday, minutes after lifting off from Texas, marking the second consecutive failure this year for Elon Musk’s Mars rocket programme.
The explosion prompted the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to halt air traffic in parts of Florida.
Several videos circulating on social media showed fiery debris streaking across the dusk skies near South Florida and the Bahamas after the spacecraft broke apart.
SpaceX’s live stream of the mission captured the moment Starship began to spin uncontrollably, with its engines shutting down before contact was lost.
The failure of this eighth Starship test comes just over a month after the seventh ended in a similar explosive failure.
Both incidents occurred during early mission phases that SpaceX had previously surpassed with ease, presenting a setback for Musk’s ambitious timeline to accelerate the program this year.
The 403-foot (123-meter) rocket system remains central to his plan to send humans to Mars by the turn of the decade.
The FAA briefly grounded flights at Miami, Fort Lauderdale, Palm Beach, and Orlando airports due to “space launch debris.” It later announced an investigation into the mishap.
The launch took place at around 6:30 p.m. ET (2330 GMT) from SpaceX’s Boca Chica, Texas, facilities. The Super Heavy first-stage booster successfully returned to Earth as planned and was caught midair by a SpaceX crane.
However, the upper stage of Starship encountered issues shortly after reaching space, Reuters reported.
SpaceX’s live feed showed the vehicle spinning uncontrollably, with a visualization indicating multiple engine shutdowns.
Soon after, the company lost contact with the spacecraft. Referencing the previous failure, SpaceX spokesperson Dan Huot remarked on the live stream, “Unfortunately this happened last time too, so we’ve got some practice now.”
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