Elon Musk's Starship rocket breaks up in sky again during testing

The test flight of Elon Musk's SpaceX Starship rocket ended in failure: the rocket fell apart.

The company shared the corresponding video on social networks.

The eighth attempt to launch the 123-meter Starship rocket took place on the night of March 7. It was launched from the company's Starbase base in South Texas. The start of the test was successful. As planned, the Starship first-stage rocket booster, known as the Super Heavy, returned to the launch pad. This is the third time that Space has managed to return the booster and then use it again.

Watch Starship's eighth flight test → https://t.co/alyJTRtgTh https://t.co/7xtpEucyQB

— SpaceX (@SpaceX) March 6, 2025

The upper part of the rocket continued to fly towards the Atlantic Ocean. The ship was scheduled to deploy payload models and then descend to land in the Indian Ocean off Western Australia about 50 minutes later.

However, during the ascent, several of the ship’s engines burned out and it began to tip over. SpaceX lost contact with the ship about nine minutes into the flight. Around that time, the ship exploded high in the sky.

Video was captured in the Bahamas of the ship’s debris burning and falling into the ocean.

RIP Starship 8! Great view from the Bahamas. @SpaceX #spacex #starship8 pic.twitter.com/8p2Dcx5gbz

— Stefanie Waldek (@StefanieWaldek) March 6, 2025

A previous Starship test flight also failed.

SpaceX designed Starship as an innovative vehicle designed for space exploration and colonization of the Moon and Mars. This program is needed to realize the company's ambitious goal of making humanity an interplanetary species, providing the possibility of resettling on other planets and creating self-sufficient settlements there. Starship is equipped with Raptor engines that run on liquid oxygen and liquid methane - resources that can potentially be mined on Mars, which makes missions more economical and autonomous. The Starship design includes two main components: a powerful Super Heavy launch vehicle and a 50-meter-high spacecraft, also called Starship. Together, they form a system with a height of approximately 122 meters, which is the largest and most powerful rocket in history. A feature of Starship is its reusability, which allows significantly reducing the cost of space flights and making them regular.

Recall that in October 2024, SpaceX conducted a successful test of the Starship spacecraft: it was possible not only to lift the ship, but also to land the first stage of the SpaceX Super Heavy launch vehicle.

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