All My SpaceXs Live in Texas …

In a blow to an endeavor contemporaneously triumphant and beset by growing-pains, SpaceX’s Starship program suffered an apparent explosion of the reusable space vehicle’s Super Heavy booster during tests at the company’s Starbase facility in Boca Chica, Texas.

By all accounts, a fire occurred while SpaceX engineers were testing the booster’s Raptor engines—all 33 of them. Regrettably, the fire spread, ultimately triggering an explosion of the booster assembly. Though little verifiable information is yet available, the incident is likely attributable to a malfunction in one or more of the rocket’s highly sophisticated, immensely powerful Raptor engines.  

SpaceX founder Elon Musk remarked in a post incident tweet: “Yeah, actually not good. Team is assessing damage.” Musk later added: “This particular issue, however, was specific to the engine spin start test (Raptor has a complex start sequence). Going forward, we won’t do a spin start test with all 33 engines at once.”

SpaceX’s launch vehicles are among the most robust and reliable in the emergent commercial space launch game. Occasional setbacks notwithstanding, Musk’s company remains the big dog in a kennel that includes mix-breeds like United Launch Alliance, the joint Boeing-Lockheed space venture; and purebreds such as Blue Origin, the Kent, Washington-based aerospace manufacturer founded by Amazon boss Jeff Bezos; and Virgin Galactic, the California spaceflight subsidiary of British billionaire and perennial cool-dude Sir Richard Charles Nicholas Branson’s Virgin Group.

SpaceX’s Falcon-9, Falcon Heavy, and Starship programs represent the vanguard of human space exploration and will likely play significant, if not pivotal roles in both humanity’s return to the moon and its first attempts to land souls on Mars.

Starship is the tallest and most powerful launch vehicle ever built. The two-stage behemoth comprises the Super Heavy booster first-stage, and the Starship second-stage and spacecraft. SpaceX offers four variants of the vehicle: cargo, crew, propellant tanker, and lunar lander.

 In an email sent approximately one day after the Super Heavy booster explosion, Musk asserted: "Damage is minor, but booster will be transferred back to the high bay for inspections, returning to the launch stand probably next week.”

The Federal Aviation Administration, which oversees space launch and rocket re-entry operations, said it was in "close contact" with SpaceX following the explosion, but that it would open no formal investigation insomuch as the incident did not occur during a formal launch campaign.

 FMI: www.spacex.com