Today it was a very important day for the starship, the suite of rockets and spacecraft that SpaceX has been working on for more than a decade. After years of tests, some of which ended abruptly due to explosions, such as Starship SN8 in 2020 and Starship SN9 in 2021, the largest spacecraft ever would attempt to approach Earth for the first time. circulate.

I say ok come closer because the plan was for the spacecraft to complete a full circle around our planet but not stay in orbit which is a test to be done later. However, none of this was possible because four minutes after the start, which took place at 15:33 (Spanish peninsular time), the starship exploded when it was about 18 miles (29 km) above the Gulf of Mexico. Said airspace was closed due to the possibility of this happening, so there were no further risks from the explosion.

Let’s remember that too it was an unmanned test, so no personal losses are regretted, which is undoubtedly the best news related to the incident. And we must remember that this type of eventuality is common in the testing phases of works as complex as a Starship. In other words, of course it’s a shame that it exploded, but this is normal, and therefore, apart from the conclusions drawn from the investigation of what happened, it should not affect the plans of SpaceX and NASA with the Artemis Program.

Congratulations @SpaceX team on an exciting starship test launch!

We learned a lot for the next test run in a few months. pic.twitter.com/gswdFut1dK

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) April 20, 2023

Although the reaction of much of the SpaceX team in the seconds immediately following launch was one of shared euphoria, the truth is that there were problems from the first moment, as five of the rocket’s 33 first-stage engines failed to ignite as expected. The investigation will have to clarify whether this first incident was more or less directly related to the subsequent explosion. In any case, the moment it became apparent that there was a problem was about half a minute before the explosion, when the upper module did not separate from the lower one to maintain the exit velocity. This caused the rocket to begin its descent from an altitude of 39 kilometers that it managed to reach to 29 at which the explosion occurred.

And what happens to the Starship and Artemis from now on? As mentioned above, these types of incidents are not uncommon, so the parties involved take it for granted that they can happen. So Elon Musk posted message in which he congratulates himself on the learning gained in this starter test, and confirms that a new edition will be produced in a few months. The US space agency reacted similarly, congratulating SpaceX on learning and confirming that they continue to count on the starship for their future plans.