Musk’s SpaceX Starship Rocket Explodes After Liftoff

The New York Times reports:

SpaceX’s Starship rocket exploded above the Gulf of Mexico on Thursday, minutes after lifting off from a launchpad in South Texas. The spacecraft failed to reach orbit.

The Starship launch on Thursday at least avoided a worst-case outcome of exploding on the launchpad, which would have required extensive repairs. Once engineers determine what went wrong, they can incorporate changes in test flights of other prototype Starships that are mostly finished and almost ready to launch.

Still, the failure raises questions about how soon SpaceX can get a Starship ready to serve as a lunar lander for the astronauts of NASA’s Artemis III mission, which is to set down near the moon’s south pole.

Read the full article.

The biggest and most powerful rocket ever built, Space X’s Starship, launches in Texas before a “rapid unscheduled disassembly” during ascenthttps://t.co/hRvf4jIThd pic.twitter.com/XJ8YCayRF2

— BBC News (World) (@BBCWorld) April 20, 2023

Space X rocket experiences a “rapid unscheduled disassembly” pic.twitter.com/hY2YZyIbb2

— Catastrophic Failure (@ohshidt) April 20, 2023

Is Twitter also undergoing “a rapid unscheduled disassembly”? https://t.co/Rg8eQB0BVw

— George Conway? (@gtconway3d) April 20, 2023

“Rapid unscheduled disassembly” is one of the all-time great euphemisms. https://t.co/2wbmcXToyI

— James Surowiecki (@JamesSurowiecki) April 20, 2023

“Rapid unscheduled disassembly” is such a friendly way of saying “it blew up, but we learned a lot on the way”

— Marques Brownlee (@MKBHD) April 20, 2023

JUST IN: SpaceX’s Starship rocket blasts off, explodes four minutes into first test flight. https://t.co/lesbUJqdqV pic.twitter.com/mk8rJAtfBA

— NBC News (@NBCNews) April 20, 2023