BOCA CHICA, Texas, Nov. 18 (UPI) — SpaceX‘s Starship spacecraft test launch ended with “rapid unscheduled disassembly,” Saturday when the booster stage and spacecraft disintegrated shortly after completing a successful stage separation.
The Starship test launch was originally planned for Friday but had to be delayed as technicians replaced a grid fin actuator, according to SpaceX CEO Elon Musk.
In April, the first Starship test flight also ended with the spacecraft disintegrating shortly after launch.
SpaceX spent months waiting for the Federal Aviation Administration to clear the Starship for a second test flight and was approved Wednesday.
The Starship lifted off from SpaceX’s Texas launch facility atop a super heavy-lift booster rocket, at about 7 a.m.
SpaceX live streamed the launch starting 35 minutes prior to the launch window.
The booster completed a “hot stage” maneuver and successfully detached from the rest of the spacecraft approximately 2 minutes and 49 seconds after liftoff.
The booster then exploded at approximately 3 minutes and 20 seconds into flight.
Watch Starship’s second integrated flight test → https://t.co/bJFjLCiTbK https://t.co/cahoRQ72lm
— SpaceX (@SpaceX) November 18, 2023
About 13 minutes after launch SpaceX announced that both the booster and Starship had experienced “RUD” or rapid unscheduled disassembly.
Saturday’s launch was intended to test the Starship on a suborbital trajectory that would have taken the Starship into space but not into orbit.
The spacecraft is intended to be reuseable and to carry astronauts across long distances in space.
