After the failed test Elon Musk congratulated his own, stating that today SpaceX has “learned” a lot, and this is actually Musk’s philosophy, a thousand miles away from that of aerospace agencies.
Was today, April 20, 2023, a failure or was it an important experiment for the future? There will probably be a lot of discussion about the launch and subsequent explosion of Starship, the most powerful and largest rocket ever built, on which SpaceX, Elon Musk’s space company, has been working since 2016. What is certain is that it was an exciting spectacle like few other spacecraft launches.
The emotion of the launch, then the accident
Stadium cheering during the countdown by SpaceX people, a small crowd gathered in front of big screens at SpaceX headquarters in Hawthorne, California, while Elon Musk stood as No. 1 in the control room.
Boom, literally, when the 40 seconds from the launch were exceeded, the figure at which he had stopped last Monday. Then again heartbeat when the countdown was rewound to 40 seconds and suspended for an apio of endless minutes for further checks, and then away, with a real roar of the 33 powerful Raptor engines, perhaps 5 less as we will see, which gave the initial thrust to take off, slowly the 120 meters or so of the Starship. A truly remarkable spectacle for the majesty of the vehicle.
All good for the first 3 minutes or so when, at 39 kilometers high, the second stage, the Starship itself, the 50-meter cargo ship that can carry 150 tons of men and materials, should have come off. But it didn’t happen unfortunately. The first stage, of power, remained attached and the rocket began to dance in the sky, literally. At this point, also seen that the rocket had veered taking the direction of the earth’s ground becoming potentially very dangerous, it was detonated at a height of 30 kilometers.
Making mistakes to learn
Kate Tice, of SpaceX, the live webcast commentator of the flight, had no hesitation and in real time, smiling, said “Getting so far is incredible”, and this is also the opinion of Musk who congratulated his saying that today SpaceX has “learned” a lot, and this is actually Musk’s philosophy, A thousand miles away from that of the agencies: making mistakes to learn.