SPACE X’s Starship rocket has exploded during a test flight – sending debris across the sky and grounding flights in Florida.
The 403-foot rocket lifted off from Starbase in Boca Chica, Texas, at around 6.30pm local time but went into an uncontrolled spin just minutes later.
Thursday’s explosion marked the third flopped launch in just months for Elon Musk’s space company.
Engines on top of Starship began shutting down as it streaked eastward, and contact was lost.
The flight was meant to end with a controlled descent over the Indian Ocean.
Bret Bostwick was watching the launch with his children from a catamaran near Ragged Island in the Bahamas when the blast happened.
He told Sky News: “I was watching with my boys, seven and nine years old, and then all of a sudden, you know, boom!
“It just turned into a big ball of fire, actually no noise.
“So there wasn’t actually a boom at that point, but just a big ball of fire.
“And both my kids knew right away it had exploded again. We had seen Starship seven explode.
“So we’re kind of, I guess, little experts down here at detecting the explosion.”
The dad described the wreckage as looking “more like a big firework show with big streamers of different debris going down”, adding that “every chunk of the ship [seemed] to glow a different colour.”
More to follow… For the latest news on this story keep checking back at The Sun Online
Thesun.co.uk is your go-to destination for the best celebrity news, real-life stories, jaw-dropping pictures and must-see video.
Like us on Facebook at www.facebook.com/thesun and follow us from our main Twitter account at @TheSun.
