SpaceX: Starship rocket suspended from flight during investigation

SpaceX’s Starship rocket was suspended from flight on Friday by the US aviation regulator, the FAA, which asked the company to open an investigation after the second stage of its rocket exploded on Thursday the day before. above the Caribbean.

During the 7th test flight of its Starship megarocket, the largest ever built, Elon Musk’s company managed to catch up with the first stage for the second time, a complex and spectacular maneuver.

But the second stage of the device was then subject to “unscheduled rapid disassembly”, in the words of SpaceX.

“No injuries were reported”

After this explosion, the FAA indicated that it had briefly diverted planes around a “space vehicle debris falling zone”.

The government of the Turks and Caicos Islands, a Caribbean archipelago located more than 2,500 kilometers from the Boca Chica launch area, Texas, announced in a statement Friday that this territory had been hit by “debris from ‘a failed SpaceX launch’.

“For the moment, no injuries have been reported and material damage is minimal,” said the authorities, who are asking residents to report space debris without touching it.

“Confirm damage to property”

On Friday, in a statement announcing the suspension of Starship flights, the FAA said it was “working with SpaceX and relevant authorities to confirm damage to property in the Turks and Caicos Islands,” in the Caribbean, specifying that it There was no information about any injuries.

Images on social media taken from these Caribbean islands show streaks of light descending from the sky, which are debris from the ship.

According to the procedure, SpaceX flights will be able to resume when it has submitted its investigation to the FAA, which must include “corrective measures”, and received the green light from the regulator. SpaceX may also submit a request to resume flights before the end of the investigation if it demonstrates that it has taken preventive measures and that the incident did not endanger the safety of the public.

Perform high-risk tests

The Starship megarocket should allow SpaceX and Elon Musk to reach the planet Mars and the American space agency, NASA, intends to use a modified version for its Artemis missions intended to return to the Moon in the coming years.

SpaceX is known for stringing together high-risk tests in order to quickly adapt its rocket depending on the problems encountered. A risky method which made it successful and allowed it to take a big lead over its competitor Blue Origin, the space company of Amazon founder Jeff Bezos. The latter successfully carried out its first flight into orbit on Thursday.

After the explosion, SpaceX said on X, the social network that Elon Musk also owns, that Thursday’s flight would help “improve Starship’s reliability.”

The man who last year became a great ally of the next American president, Donald Trump, had for his part clarified on the same network that the explosion had probably been triggered by an “oxygen/fuel leak”.

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