Starship rocket explodes

SPACEX is not having the best of luck this week – first the Falcon 9 launch was scrubbed on Wednesday and now the firms’ prototype Starship rocket has exploded.

The prototype, Serial Number 4, vanished into a fireball at Spacex’s Boca Chica site in Texas on Friday after the engine was ignited for a pressurised test. The failure comes days after Spacex had to abort the blast-off of its Falcon 9 rocket, in what would have been the first manned launch from US soil in nine years.

The launch was rescheduled for another attempt to send astronauts to the International Space Station yesterday afternoon but the weather outlook along Florida’s east coast put the chances of another delay at 50%. This is the fourth rocket that has been lost while testing – all of the the previous vessels also imploded during testing.

Starship, a rocket standing 120 metres tall, is designed to carry humans and 100 tons of cargo to the moon, Mars and beyond.

AP The Spacex Falcon 9, with Dragon crew capsule on top of the rocket, sits on Launch Pad 39-A, on Friday, at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida. The Starship is designed to carry humans and 100 tons of cargo to the moon and Mars. |

A PROTOTYPE of the Spacex rocket Starship explodes during ground tests, in Boca Chica, Texas, in this still image obtained from a Youtube video. | Reuters