SpaceX’s Starship explodes, a back-to-back mishap that dents Musk’s Mars ambitions
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Debris seen streaking through the sky, after SpaceX's Starship exploded, in Big Sampson Kay, the Bahamas on March 6.
PHOTO: REUTERS
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TEXAS – SpaceX’s massive Starship spacecraft exploded in space on March 6, minutes after lifting off from Texas, causing the authorities to halt air traffic in parts of Florida, in the second straight failure in 2025 for Mr Elon Musk’s Mars rocket programme.
Several videos on social media showed fiery debris streaking through the dusk skies near south Florida and the Bahamas after Starship broke up in space shortly after it began to spin uncontrollably with its engines cut off, a SpaceX live stream of the mission showed.
The failure of the eighth Starship test comes just over a month after the seventh also ended in an explosive failure
The 123m-tall rocket system is central to his plan to send humans to Mars as soon as the turn of the decade.
The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) briefly issued ground stops at the Miami, Fort Lauderdale, Palm Beach and Orlando airports because of “space launch debris”. It said it opened an investigation into the incident.
The rocket lifted off at about 6.30pm local time (7.30am on March 7, Singapore time) from SpaceX’s Boca Chica, Texas, rocket facilities. The first-stage booster flew back to Earth as planned and was grabbed in mid-air by a SpaceX crane. But minutes later, SpaceX’s live stream showed Starship’s upper stage spinning in space, while a visualisation of the rocket’s engines showed multiple engines shut down.
The company then said it lost contact, and announcers immediately drew a connection to the previous flight. “Unfortunately this happened last time too, so we’ve got some practice now,” SpaceX spokesperson Dan Huot said on the live stream.
In a statement late on March 6, SpaceX said Starship experienced an “energetic event” in its aft section, which resulted in the loss of several engines.
“This in turn led to a loss of attitude control and ultimately a loss of communications with Starship. Final contact with Starship came approximately 9 minutes and 30 seconds after lift-off.”
SpaceX said there are no toxic materials among the debris.
The Starship failure in January ended eight minutes into flight when the rocket exploded, raining debris over the Caribbean islands and causing minor damage to a car in the Turks and Caicos Islands.
The FAA, which regulates private rocket launches, said its investigation would require SpaceX to examine the failure’s cause and get the agency’s sign-off before Starship can fly again.
The FAA in February approved SpaceX’s launch licence for the test flight on March 7 while its investigation into the previous failure remained open. It said it had reviewed early details from the company’s mishap probe before determining that Starship’s eighth flight could proceed.
Starship was aiming to make nearly a full orbit around Earth and re-enter over the Indian Ocean for a splashdown, simulating a landing sequence that SpaceX wants to soon carry out on land as a key next phase of the rocket’s development. REUTERS
