SpaceX Prototype Mars Ship Explodes
SN10, a SpaceX rocket prototype, successfully soared with a high-altitude over South Texas on Wednesday.
However, multiple independent video feeds showed that after about three minutes after landing, the vehicle didn't succeed in holding itself cool, blast about eight minutes after landing.
The company also build two prototype Starship Mars rocket, but both ended in an explosive crash.
The recent test flight of SpaceX marked as the first successful landing for a Starship prototype.
"We've had a successful soft touch down on the landing pad," SpaceX engineer John Insprucker said during a live stream of the event. "That's capping a beautiful test flight of Starship 10."
It was not yet clarified why the rocket exploded after landing, and the company's live stream was cut off before the incident.
In a CNN report, John Insprucker stressed that SpaceX has several other prototypes already in production, and the next, SN11, will be ready to roll out for another test flight "in the near future."
"Third time's a charm, as the saying goes," SpaceX principal integration engineer John Insprucker said during SpaceX's launch webcast today. "We've had a successful soft touchdown on the landing pad that's capping a beautiful test flight of Starship 10."
SpaceX CEO Elon Musk tweeted that the abort was triggered by pre-set standards around the rocket's thrust, which Musk described as "slightly conservative."
Reports said that SpaceX recycled the SN10's fuel ahead of the second successful attempt.
The SpaceX Starship was built for various objectives, including aiding NASA's Moon landing efforts, shuttling paying customers between cities at breakneck speeds, and launching cargo and human missions to Mars.
Musk stressed in a recent interview with Joe Rogan that he expected Starship to be conducting regular flights by 2023, and he hoped the vehicle would reach orbit by the end of this year. It's not clear if SpaceX will hit that deadline.
