The SpaceX rocket, Starship, sits on the launchpad at Boca Chica Beach on Tuesday. The rocket was launched this morning but exploded in midair. BLANCA CASTILLO/THE RIDER PHOTOS
Today, people from across the country camped out near Texas Highway 48 and South Padre Island in anticipation of the SpaceX Starship’s rescheduled launch.
Having scrubbed its April 17 launch due to a pressurization issue, many were hopeful that this launch would succeed.
After takeoff, Starship experienced complications separating from the boosters. The SpaceX livestream showed the rocket spinning and then exploding after flying for about four minutes.
“The vehicle experienced multiple engines out during the flight test, lost altitude, and began to tumble. The flight termination system was commanded on both the booster and ship,” according to the SpaceX.com website.
“As if the flight test was not exciting enough, Starship experienced a rapid unscheduled disassembly before stage separation,” SpaceX tweeted.
Despite the explosion, SpaceX and its founder Elon Musk reacted positively, with SpaceX tweeting, “With a test like this, success comes from what we learn, and today’s test will help us improve Starship’s reliability as SpaceX seeks to make life multi-planetary.”
Musk tweeted, “Congrats @SpaceX team on an exciting test launch of Starship! Learned a lot for the next test launch in a few months.”
It was the first fully integrated test flight with both the Starship and the booster.
SpaceX commentators considered a liftoff from the pad as successful, claiming any information that they learn will help improve future builds of Starship.
The Rider sent emails to SpaceX media relations to request an interview but as of press time, they had not responded.
On April 17, hundreds of spectators and livestream viewers were disappointed after SpaceX scrubbed the Starship launch, which was scheduled to take off from Boca Chica beginning at 8 a.m., due to a frozen pressurization valve, Musk tweeted.
At 8:11 a.m., Musk tweeted, “A pressurant valve appears to be frozen, so unless it starts operating soon, no launch today.” After the scrub, SpaceX continued with a wet dress rehearsal.
A wet dress rehearsal puts the rocket through each step of a launch without launching the rocket.
The launch was rescheduled for today, with the 62-minute launch window opening at 8:28 a.m.
Ryan Lopez, team captain for the UTRGV Rocket Launchers has been following SpaceX for around four or five years and said this launch is different from all the others before it.
“This is the first full attempt at launching the Starship, which is the upper half, and then the booster, which is the lower, more powerful separation of the rocket,” Lopez said in an April 18 Zoom interview. “The booster would be able to take you out into Earth’s orbit, and then that would come back down and ideally you would be able to reuse it.”
Lopez said this is the first test for the booster and Starship when before it had just been the Starship.
“For this launch in particular they want to prioritize going into orbit,” he said.
The rocket is a fully reusable transportation system designed to carry crew and cargo to Earth orbit, return to the moon, and travel to Mars and beyond, according to the SpaceX website.
“Starship will be the world’s most powerful launch vehicle ever developed and will be able to carry up to 10 people on long-duration, interplanetary flights,” according to SpaceX.com. “Starship will also help enable satellite delivery, the development of a Moon base, and point-to-point transport on Earth.”
