Aviation regulator diverts flights from four airports in Florida to avoid falling debris.
SpaceX’s Starship has exploded shortly after takeoff in the second launch failure this year for Elon Musk’s interplanetary exploration programme.
But Musk’s rocket company was able to successfully return its mammoth first-stage booster to the launchpad following Thursday’s test-flight, catching it in its giant mechanical “chopsticks” for the third time.
SpaceX’s livestream showed the Starship spacecraft spinning uncontrollably in space minutes after its liftoff from the company’s launch site in Boca Chica, Texas.
“You can see we’ve lost several engines and we’ve lost attitude control for the vehicle,” SpaceX communications manager Dan Huot said during the livestream.
“Once you lose enough of those centre engines, you’re going to lose attitude control,” Huot added.
“And so, we did see the ship start to go into a spin, and at this point, we have lost contact with the ship.”
Footage posted on social media showed fiery debris streaking across the skies of south Florida and the Bahamas as the remnants of the craft reentered the earth’s atmosphere.
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The Federal Aviation Administration briefly halted flights to four Florida airports, including Miami international airport, due to falling debris.
The aviation regulator said it had also launched a “mishap investigation” to “determine the root cause of the event, and identify corrective actions to avoid it from happening again”.
The mixed outcome comes after SpaceX’s seventh test-flight in January ended with the mid-flight breakup of the Starship, forcing airlines to divert flights to avoid falling debris.
In a statement after Thursday’s botched launch, SpaceX said the space vehicle had “experienced a rapid unscheduled disassembly” before contact was lost.
“Our team immediately began coordination with safety officials to implement pre-planned contingency responses,” the company said on X.
“We will review the data from today’s flight test to better understand [the] root cause. As always, success comes from what we learn, and today’s flight will offer additional lessons to improve Starship’s reliability.”
NASA has contracted SpaceX to develop its Starship for use in its Artemis programme, which aims to return astronauts to the moon this decade.
Musk, the world’s richest man, has said he hopes to use Starship to fulfil his longtime vision of establishing a permanent colony on Mars by 2050.