SpaceX Starship Goes Farther Than Before — But Ends With Fiery Ocean Plunge

SpaceX’s Starship, the biggest and most powerful launch vehicle ever, lifted off on Tuesday before losing contact more than half an hour later and falling into the Indian Ocean.

The Elon Musk-led company has been counting on the launch vehicle to carry out interplanetary missions, including a much-touted vision of Musk to build a colony on Mars.

The uncrewed mission was launched at 6:36 p.m. local time using SpaceX’s Super Heavy booster from the company’s Starbase launch site on the Gulf Coast, near Brownsville, Texas.

While the Starship managed to go beyond the two prior missions this year, which exploded shortly after launch, at about 46 minutes into the flight, the company lost contact with the vehicle, which fell into a designated area in the Indian Ocean.

CNN reported, citing SpaceX’s Dan Huot, that a fuel leak caused the loss of control.

SpaceX had initially planned for the ninth Starship test to last over an hour before a controlled descent into the ocean.

The company managed to reuse its Super Heavy booster, which was one of the mission's key goals. While it did not plan to return the booster to its launch site like before, it intended for a controlled splashdown in the Gulf of Mexico.

However, SpaceX lost contact with the booster after the landing burn started when it experienced a “rapid unscheduled disassembly,” according to the company, which essentially implied that it crashed.

The Starship also failed to deploy eight Starlink simulator satellites as a payload bay door malfunction prevented it from opening.

“With a test like this, success comes from what we learn, and today’s test will help us improve Starship’s reliability as SpaceX seeks to make life multiplanetary,” the company said.

The failure of its previous two flights prompted the Federal Aviation Administration to close nearly double the airspace.

“Launch cadence for the next three flights will be faster – approximately one every three to four weeks,” Musk said following the launch.

Retail sentiment on Stocktwits was in the ‘neutral’ (46/100) territory, while retail chatter was ‘high.’

SpaceX, one of the world’s most valuable private companies, is racing to make the rocket capable enough to carry NASA astronauts to the moon in 2027.

However, Musk's involvement in President Donald Trump's administration has led to conflict-of-interest allegations and increased scrutiny of the company.

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