A SpaceX Starship rocket broke up in space minutes after launching from Texas on Thursday.
rocket broke up in space minutes after launching from Texas on Thursday, forcing airline flights over the Gulf of Mexico to alter course to avoid falling debris and setting back Elon Musk’s flagship rocket program.mission control lost contact with the newly upgraded Starship , carrying its first test payload of mock satellites but no crew, eight minutes after liftoff from its south Texas rocket facilities at 5.38pm .
“We did lose all communications with the ship — that is essentially telling us we had an anomaly with the upper stage,” SpaceX communications manager Dan Huot said, confirming minutes later that the ship was lost. The Federal Aviation Administration, which regulates private launch activities, said it had briefly slowed and diverted planes around the area where space debris was falling, but normal operations had since resumed.The FAA regularly closes airspace for space launches and re-entries, but it can create a “debris response area” to prevent aircraft from entering if the space vehicle experiences an anomaly outside the originally closed zone.
Musk said a preliminary assessment of the failure showed an internal leak of liquid oxygen fuel built up pressure and led to the rocket’s break-up.The FAA is likely to open a mishap investigation that would ground Starship — as the agency has done in the past — and examine whether any of the debris from the rocket’s midflight blast fell on populated areas or outside of Starship’s predetermined hazard zone.
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