According to CNN’s Jackie Wattles, regulators are looking into reports of property damage from falling debris in Turks and Caicos. Pieces of the broken-up spacecraft also disrupted airspace over the Gulf of Mexico, as Joey Roulette reports for Reuters. Dozens of commercial flights altered their paths to avoid potential debris, and some departures in Florida experienced delays.
“The FAA briefly slowed and diverted aircraft around the area where space vehicle debris was falling,” agency officials explain to Space.com’s Mike Wall.
SpaceX spokesman Dan Huot tells the AP that “it was great to see a booster come down, but we are obviously bummed out about ship.” He emphasizes, however, that “it’s a flight test. It’s an experimental vehicle.” Starship was only carrying ten mock Starlink satellites, which engineers had planned for it to release as practice.
In addition to executing a second booster catch, Starship’s most recent test flight also achieved the successful restarting of a Raptor engine used in a previous test flight, according to CBS News’ William Harwood. This is a small but crucial step for SpaceX’s goal of building a “ fully reusable transportation system,” because it shows that the engines can fly on multiple missions. |
