What is Starship?
The Starship launch system is the world’s first fully re-useable orbital launch vehicle. Developed by SpaceX, it is the largest and most powerful launch vehicle ever built. coming in at over 120 meters tall and with twice the thrust of Saturn V (the rocket that took humans to the moon), it is truly massive.
SpaceX plan to use this new launch vehicle to go back to the Moon, and eventually on to Mars! They also plan to use it to deploy their Starlink satellites, which deliver high-speed wireless internet connections all over the world.
More information about Starship can be found here: https://www.spacex.com/vehicles/starship/
Image credit: Singularity Hub
First flight
The first flight of the fully integrated Starship launch system* flight took place on the 20th of April, 2023 at Boca Chica in Texas.
The launch was held at 40 seconds due to a final pressurisation issue in the booster, but the launch was able to continue after a short time. Once they got the all-clear from everyone involved, they continued with countdown.
5 … 4 … 3 … 2 … 1 …
Pure excitement. Starship, with all components lifted-off from the pad, soaring slowly into the sky. The atmosphere was ecstatic, not only from spectators, but also from the staff at SpaceX.
A fiery end
Image credit: Wired
Around 4 minutes into the flight, just after Max Q (maximum aerodynamic pressure on the vehicle), when the booster was due to seperate, disaster struck.
Instead of separating, the entire rocket started spinning, top over bottom, top over bottom, top over bottom. This left the team on the ground with no other option but to press the button and terminate the flight, causing Starship to self-destruct.
Why?
Engineers say the spinning was due to a number of factors, most notably several of the 33 engines not igniting. This left an imbalance in thrust on the sides of the spacecraft, causing a spin.
Some spectators noted that as the flight continued, more and more of the engines shut down, only making the imbalance worse. Others have mentioned that by the termination of the flight, around a dozen of the engines weren’t operational.
As you can see in the graphic below – which SpaceX had on the bottom of the screen throughout the event so that spectators could see the status of the vehicle – there is an indication for which of the engines were alight. In an ideal situation, all the circles would be filled in with white, but that was not the case. Please note that not all the circles are filled, meaning not all the engines were alight.
* Fully integrated means all the components of the vehicle, typically in a configuration identical to that of an actual mission, but without the payload.