Blue Origin, SpaceX both experience success, failure during Thursday launches
It has been an exciting day for space enthusiasts in the United States.
Blue Origin successfully launched its New Glenn rocket from Florida early Thursday morning, and SpaceX caught a booster upon landing at its Texas facility later in the day, but neither launch was without failures.
Blue Origin successfully launches New Glenn but loses booster
What we know:
Blue Origin's launch marked the first successful test flight for Jeff Bezos’ company from the Space Coast.
As remarkable as New Glenn's liftoff was, the real test was retrieving the booster. The goal was to land it on a floating barge in the Atlantic – a feat Blue Origin knew was ambitious. It ultimately didn’t pan out.
What they're saying:
Blue Origin posted to X, "We lost the booster during descent… we’ll learn, refine and apply that knowledge to our next launch in the spring."
What we don't know:
It is not immediately known what happened to the Blue Origin booster.
"We'll learn, refine, and apply that knowledge to our next launch in the spring," Blue Origin said.
What they're saying:
Don Platt, director of Spaceport Education Center at Florida Tech weighed in.
"It was not successfully able to land on the barge; it’s probably crashed into a number of pieces," Platt said. "Some of it could wash ashore. We’ve seen that happen before with rocket parts and pieces"
SpaceX Starship explodes after Super Heavy booster catch
What we know:
Miles away in Texas, SpaceX had the reverse issue. In a remarkable scene, the company successfully caught the returning booster following Thursday’s Starship rocket launch.
The launch tower’s mechanical arms, referred to as "chopsticks,", literally caught the booster midflight as it came back to the launch pad. However, the successful catch quickly turned to disappointment.
At just 8.5 minutes into flight, SpaceX lost contact with Starship as the rocket’s 6 engines shut off one by one.
"Starship experienced a rapid unscheduled disassembly during its ascent burn," SpaceX posted on X.
What we don't know:
The cause of the explosion is still under investigation.
SpaceX says it plans to review data from the test to make a determination.
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