(Tokyo) A major fire broke out on Tuesday at a site of the Japanese space agency while it was testing a solid fuel Epsilon S rocket, according to images from public television channel NHK.
Posted at 9:12 p.m.
No injuries were reported following the incident in the remote Kagoshima prefecture in southern Japan.
Fireballs and white smoke rose around 8:30 a.m. local time (6:30 p.m. Eastern Time) from the Tanegashima Space Center, these images showed.
Contacted by AFP, officials from the Japanese Space Agency (JAXA) could not immediately be reached.
According to NHK, the fire occurred during a test burn, which was attended by media about 600 meters away.
About 30 seconds into the test, a loud explosion was heard, and what appeared to be a burning object flew toward the sea, NHK reported.
The Sankei newspaper reported that orange flames gushed from the rocket engine placed on a horizontal platform before the explosion.
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