SpaceX marked the launch of its first flight test of a fully integrated Starship and Super Heavy rocket from Starbase in Texas today (8.28am central time).
However the mission ended in failure when the booster tried to separate from the upper stage, technically what engineers described as a “rapid unscheduled disassembly”. Teams will review data and see what lessons can be learned before the next flight test “in a few months”.
Starship was billed as a fully reusable transportation system designed to carry both crew and cargo to Earth’s orbit ‘and help humanity return to the Moon, and travel to Moon and beyond’.
To date, the SpaceX team has completed multiple sub-orbital flight tests of Starship’s upper stage from Starbase. These flight tests helped validate the vehicle’s design, proving Starship can fly through the subsonic phase of entry before re-lighting its engines and flipping itself to a vertical configuration for landing.
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