SpaceX Starship SN10 launch - as it happened: Mars-bound prototype finally lands but explodes shortly after
Roughly eight minutes after landing, SN10 exploded while sitting at a lean on the landing pad
Your support helps us to tell the story
From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.
At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.
The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.
Your support makes all the difference.SpaceX has successfully performed a flight test of its Mars-bound Starship spacecraft on Wednesday after several delays.
Starship SN10 lifted off to 10km before landing successfully at SpaceX’s Boca Chica facility in Texas, achieving what its predecessors could not.
Roughly eight minutes after landing, SN10 exploded while sitting at a lean on the landing pad.
Despite the explosion, the high-altitude flight test marked significant progress towards Elon Musk’s Mars ambitions.
SpaceX provided a live stream of the launch and landing, but did ended it before the explosion took place.
You can read all the updates as they happened here.
Reattempt on track
We’re still on track here for a high-altitude flight test of Starship SN10.
All being well, lift-off will take place in just under 30 minutes.
SpaceX’s official stream will be live in about 15-20 minutes - we’ll have it right here as soon as it’s live.
Still no venting
There is a distinct lack of venting happening on the launchpad right now, suggesting SpaceX’s timeframe may need to be revised.
There is less than two hours left in this launch window.
Condenser spewing
The condenser is beginning to spew some vapour, which typically indicates that we’re anywhere from 30-50 minutes away from lift-off.
Preparations continue
There is a lot of venting happening on the launchpad right now as propel loading continues.
This is a great indicator that SpaceX is nearing the final stages of preparation ahead of a launch attempt.
SpaceX targeting 5.13pm
SpaceX is leaving it late for this test. Joey Roulette, a space correspondent at The Verge, reports that the launch attempt is scheduled for 5.13pm local time (11.13pm GMT).
If this attempt fails, there will be no time left to reset and reenter the launch countdown sequence.
Tri-vents underway
The final process of this launch sequence has occurred, with the Raptor engines venting.
That means there’s just 10 minutes to go until launch.
Still waiting on official SpaceX stream
There is still no official live stream of the Starship SN10 launchpad from SpaceX, but everything continues to move in the right direction.
It’s roughly T-minus 5 minutes until lift-off.
SpaceX stream is here!
And right on time, here’s the official SpaceX stream:
Join our commenting forum
Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies
Comments