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SpaceX's Megarocket Blows Up Over Indian Ocean in Latest Bumpy Test
The Straits Times
|May 29, 2025
SpaceX's prototype Starship exploded over the Indian Ocean on May 27, capping another bumpy test flight for the rocket central to billionaire Elon Musk's dream of colonizing Mars.
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SOUTH PADRE ISLAND, United States —
The biggest and most powerful launch vehicle ever built lifted off at 6:36 p.m. (7:36 a.m. Singapore time) from the company's Starbase facility, near a southern Texas village that earlier in May voted to become a city, which is also named Starbase.
Excitement ran high among SpaceX engineers and spectators alike, after the last two outings ended with the upper stage disintegrating in fiery cascades over the Caribbean.
But signs of trouble emerged quickly. The first-stage Super Heavy booster blew up instead of executing its planned splashdown in the Gulf of Mexico.
A live feed then showed the upper-stage spaceship failing to open its doors to deploy a payload of Starlink satellite "simulators."
Though the ship flew farther than on its two previous attempts, it sprang leaks and began spinning out of control as it coasted through space.
This story is from the May 29, 2025 edition of The Straits Times.
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