New Delhi: SpaceX’s Starship suffered its third consecutive failure as the megarocket exploded during splashdown on its ninth test flight, with founder Elon Musk attributing the mishap to a fuel leak.
The latest test flight, which launched from SpaceX’s Starbase facility in Texas at around 7:36 p.m. EDT (5:06 a.m. IST), successfully reached orbit and flew farther than the previous two attempts in January and March, both of which ended prematurely with the destruction of the spacecraft.
However, the mission encountered critical issues when the payload bay door failed to open, preventing the release of simulated Starlink satellites. About 30 minutes into the flight, SpaceX confirmed a fuel tank leak aboard the vehicle. This led to a loss of main tank pressure during the coast and re-entry phase, causing the first-stage Super Heavy booster to explode just before its expected splashdown.
Live footage showed the upper-stage vehicle spinning uncontrollably as it re-entered Earth’s atmosphere, ultimately resulting in a rapid unscheduled disassembly approximately six minutes after launch. SpaceX described this as the end of the first reflight of a Super Heavy booster.
Despite the setback, Musk praised the flight as an achievement, highlighting that the Starship reached the scheduled engine cutoff and that there was no significant loss of heat shield tiles during ascent. He noted the flight showed big improvements over the previous attempt and provided valuable data for future reviews.
SpaceX affirmed it will continue analyzing the flight data and preparing for the next test. Standing 403 feet (123 meters) tall, the Starship and its heavy booster comprise the world’s largest and most powerful rocket system. It is also slated to launch NASA’s Artemis 3 moon lander, which aims to land astronauts on the lunar surface by 2026.
With IANS inputs