SpaceX's Starship rocket was launched on a test flight, but the spacecraft disintegrated. The company says it has experienced moments of excitement and disappointment.
SpaceX launched its Starship rocket on its most recent test flight on Thursday, but the spacecraft was destroyed after a thrilling grab of the booster back on the pad.
Elon Musk's company indicated that the six engines of the spacecraft seemed to have turned off one by one, so they lost contact 8 and a half minutes into the flight.
The spacecraft was supposed to fly over the Gulf of Mexico from Texas in a nearly circular path around the world similar to previous test flights.
SpaceX had loaded it with 10 simulated satellites to practice releasing it. It was the first flight of this new and improved spacecraft.
A minute earlier, SpaceX used the launch tower's giant mechanical arms to catch the returning booster, a feat it had only accomplished once.
The descending thruster remained suspended above the launch pad and was subsequently picked up by the pair of arms nicknamed chopsticks.
bittersweet moment
The excitement of the capture quickly turned to disappointment not only for the company, but also for the crowds gathered in the southern tip of Texas.
“It was great to see a booster come down, but we're obviously disappointed for the ship,” said SpaceX spokesman Dan Huot, adding that it would take time to analyze the data and figure out what happened. “It's a flight test. It's an experimental vehicle.”
The latest data received from the spacecraft indicated that it reached an altitude of 146 kilometers (90 miles) and a speed of 21,317 kilometers per hour (13,245 miles per hour).
The 400-foot (123-meter) rocket had lifted off late in the afternoon from Boca Chica Beach near the Mexican border. The late hour ensured a daylight entry halfway around the world in the Indian Ocean. But the shiny, retro-looking spaceship never made it that far.
SpaceX had upgraded the spacecraft for the latest demonstration. The test satellites were the same size as SpaceX's Starlink internet satellites and, like the spacecraft, were intended to be destroyed upon entry.
Musk plans to launch real Starlinks on Starships before moving on to other satellites and, eventually, crews.
It was the seventh test flight for the world's largest and most powerful rocket. NASA has reserved a pair of Starships to land astronauts on the moon later this decade. Musk's goal is Mars.
Hours earlier in Florida, another billionaire's rocket company, Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin, launched the newest supersonic rocket, New Glenn.
The rocket reached orbit on its first flight, successfully placing an experimental satellite thousands of kilometers above Earth. But the first stage booster was destroyed, missing its target landing on a floating platform in the Atlantic Ocean.