Space X Boca Chico launch loses contact

 Reuters:

SpaceX's uncrewed spacecraft Starship, developed to carry astronauts to the moon and beyond, failed in space shortly after lifting off on Saturday, cutting short its second test but making it further than an earlier attempt that ended in an explosion.

The two-stage rocketship blasted off from the Elon Musk-owned company's Starbase launch site near Boca Chica in Texas, helping boost the Starship spacecraft as high as 90 miles (148 km) above ground on a planned 90-minute test mission to space and back.

But the rocket's Super Heavy first stage booster, though it achieved a crucial maneuver to separate with its core Starship stage, exploded over the Gulf of Mexico shortly after detaching, a SpaceX webcast showed.

Meanwhile, the core Starship stage boosted further toward space, but a few minutes later a company broadcaster said that SpaceX mission control suddenly lost contact with the vehicle.

"We have lost the data from the second stage... we think we may have lost the second stage," SpaceX engineer and livestream host John Insprucker said. He added that engineers believe an automated flight termination command was triggered to destroy the rocket, though the reason was unclear.

About eight minutes into the test mission, a camera view tracking the Starship booster appeared to show an explosion that suggested the vehicle failed at that time. The rocket's altitude was 91 miles (148 km).
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The mission's objective was to get Starship off the ground in Texas and into space just shy of reaching orbit, then plunge through Earth's atmosphere for a splashdown off Hawaii's coast. The launch had been scheduled for Friday but was pushed back by a day for a last-minute swap of flight-control hardware.

Starship's failure to meet all of its test objectives could pose a setback for SpaceX. The FAA will need to review the company's failure investigation and review its application for a new launch license. SpaceX officials have complained that such regulatory reviews take too long.

On the other hand, the failure in a program for which SpaceX plans to spend roughly $2 billion this year was in line with the company's risk-tolerant culture that embraces fast-paced testing and re-testing of prototypes to hasten design and engineering improvements.

"More things were successful than in the previous test, including some new capabilities that were significant," said Carissa Christensen, CEO of space analytics firm BryceTech.
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It will take more testing before a crewed Starship launch.  Boca Chico is at the southern tip of Texas near Brownsville and Padre Island.  The launch sends the craft to the east over the Gulf of Mexico. I used to live in San Benito a few miles north of Boca Chico and we used to go fishing down there.