HOUSTON — A SpaceX Starship spacecraft, the upper portion of the most powerful launch system ever built, exploded during its eighth test flight Thursday, disrupting air traffic and marking the second consecutive failure for the vehicle this year.
The uncrewed Starship mission lifted off at 5:30 p.m. CT (6:30 p.m. ET) from SpaceX’s Starbase facility in South Texas, with the spacecraft riding atop a 232-foot-tall (71-meter-tall) Super Heavy rocket booster.
After about 2 ½ minutes of firing, the Super Heavy booster separated as planned from the Starship’s upper stage, setting itself up for a successful landing within the “chopstick” arms of “Mechazilla,” or SpaceX’s launch tower near Brownsville, Texas. It’s the third time SpaceX has successfully executed the chopsticks booster catch.
But less than 10 minutes into the flight, the Starship craft, which had continued on toward space, began to experience issues. Several of the vehicle’s engines visibly cut out during the livestream, and the ship began to tumble before SpaceX lost contact with it.
“Once you lose enough of those center engines, you’re going to lose attitude control,” said Dan Huot, SpaceX communications manager, on the livestream. “And so we did see the ship start to go into a spin, and at this point, we have lost contact with the ship.”
The loss of signal occurred at roughly the same point during this mission as with Flight 7 in January, when Starship exploded over populated islands in Turks and Caicos, littering the islands with debris.
It has not been confirmed where exactly the vehicle exploded during Thursday’s mission. But the explosion was visible from parts of Florida and over the Caribbean, according to reports from residents of those locations that were shared with CNN.
The Federal Aviation Administration halted flights into Miami, Fort Lauderdale, Palm Beach, and Orlando airports Thursday evening for “falling space debris” until 8 p.m. ET.
The FAA also temporarily kept flights from departing from Fort Lauderdale/Hollywood International Airport and Miami International Airport. Flights leaving those airports were still delayed on average by 30 and 45 minutes, respectively, as of Thursday night.
“We’ve got a lot of measures in place, like debris response areas, where we coordinate very closely with air traffic control,” Huot said on the livestream. “We have a lot of measures put (in place) before we ever launch a rocket to make sure that we’re keeping the public safe. Those worked last time and they’re actively in work right now.”
SpaceX shared an update with a few details on the incident several hours after the flight.
“Prior to the end of the ascent burn, an energetic event in the aft portion of Starship resulted in the loss of several Raptor engines,” according to a statement from SpaceX. “This in turn led to a loss of attitude control and ultimately a loss of communications with Starship. Final contact with Starship came approximately 9 minutes and 30 seconds after liftoff.”
SpaceX said that Starship flew within a designated launch corridor.
“Any surviving debris would have fallen within the pre-planned Debris Response Area,” according to the statement. “There are no toxic materials present in the debris and no significant impacts expected to occur to marine species or water quality. If you believe you have identified a piece of debris, please contact your local authorities or the SpaceX Debris Hotline at 1-866-623-0234 or at recovery@spacex.com.”
Meanwhile, the FAA is requiring SpaceX to perform a mishap investigation into the loss of the Starship vehicle, according to a statement released by the agency.
“A mishap investigation is designed to enhance public safety, determine the root cause of the event, and identify corrective actions to avoid it from happening again,” according to the statement. “The FAA will be involved in every step of the SpaceX-led mishap investigation process and must approve SpaceX’s final report, including any corrective actions. A return to flight is based on the FAA determining that any system, process, or procedure related to the mishap does not affect public safety.”
Thursday’s launch was SpaceX’s second go at getting Flight 8 off the ground. The company waved off a Monday attempt due to “too many question marks,” according to SpaceX CEO Elon Musk.
Thursday’s launch occurred seven weeks after an explosive mishap prematurely ended Starship’s seventh test flight, raining debris over the islands of Turks and Caicos on January 16.
The FAA — which licenses commercial rocket launches — is still overseeing an investigation into the incident, but the agency gave SpaceX the green light on February 28 to launch Flight 8. The agency noted that the probe into the Flight 7 mishap was ongoing, but the FAA determined SpaceX had “met all safety, environmental and other licensing requirements for the suborbital test flight,” according to a statement.
In its statement to CNN given after the January Flight 7 mishap, the FAA said that it told the Turks and Caicos government that the archipelago was located within a potential hazard area related to the Starship launch.
The agency also said that, before the test flight launched, it required SpaceX to map out “hazard areas sufficient to ensure that the probability of casualty to a member of the public on land or on board a maritime vessel does not exceed one in one million.”
“No Caribbean islands, including Turks and Caicos, exceeded this threshold,” the agency said.
The seventh test flight also exploded less than 10 minutes into flight.
The company believes the root cause was a leak that occurred in the rear section of the vehicle near a tank containing superchilled liquid oxygen, or a form of rocket propellant.
While no property damage or injuries were reported, one vehicle was struck on the island of South Caicos, and debris caused brief flight disruptions as air traffic controllers rushed to reroute planes away from the site of the explosion.
However, residents of the archipelago of Turks and Caicos told CNN they are still finding debris from the spacecraft littering beaches and roadways. The local government worked with SpaceX to craft a debris recovery plan. However, the contents of the plan have not been made public and it’s not clear who is paying for the cleanup effort.
Neither SpaceX nor the Turks and Caicos government responded to requests for comment on the plan.
A Turks and Caicos government account on Instagram shared an advisory to the public Thursday regarding the Flight 8 incident.
“We wish to advise the public that this evening’s SpaceX launch appears to have broken up in flight,” the advisory read. “We are in contact with the US FAA, SpaceX and UK agency leads to confirm the position. Post-incident protocols have been engaged. The National Security Secretariat will continue to keep the public apprised as we work to ensure the safety and security of our Islands.”
SpaceX has long embraced an engineering and development philosophy it calls “rapid iterative development.” The goal has been to rapidly build Starship prototypes and put them on the launchpad with a willingness to blow them up.
What’s different about the last Starship mission in January and Thursday’s flight is where and how the debris fell.
While the first test flight of Starship and Super Heavy blew up a launchpad at SpaceX’s Starbase facilities in 2023, January’s Flight 7 and Thursday’s Flight 8 both allowed Starship to travel out over the Atlantic and Caribbean before exploding near populated islands.
Thursday’s mishap raises questions about why the FAA allowed Starship to launch before the agency’s investigation into the Flight 7 mishap was completed — and whether experimental rockets should be allowed to fly over populated areas.
Thursday’s flight test was intended to put Starship through its paces so mission teams could zero in on weak points. Engineers have removed a large number of heat shield tiles from Starship to test vulnerable areas across the spacecraft. The black hexagonal tiles are designed to protect the vehicle as it experiences temperatures exceeding 2,600 degrees Fahrenheit (1,427 degrees Celsius) when reentering Earth’s atmosphere.
The failed test flight in January spurred SpaceX to make other upgrades and changes, including new vents and a “purge system” designed to prevent a fire, according to the company.
SpaceX said what mission teams learned from the Flight 7 mishap prompted them to alter lines that feed fuel to some of Starship’s engines and tweak propellant temperatures. Another change adjusted the vehicle’s “operating thrust target” — or how much power SpaceX aims for the engines to generate during flight.
Meanwhile, the Super Heavy booster has some upgrades of its own, including a more powerful flight computer.
About 17 ½ minutes after lifting off, Starship was planning to attempt to deploy a batch of mock Starlink satellites for the first time. Like the spacecraft, the demo satellites weren’t intended to reach orbit. But similar to the seventh flight test, Flight 8’s objectives were not tested before the incident occurred. — CNN
