SpaceX launches Starship rocket, fails to recover booster

BREAKING: SpaceX's Starship booster explodes over the Gulf of Mexico during its most ambitious test flight, as the spacecraft continues into orbit after a failed first attempt to recover both stages.

SpaceX's biggest booster just exploded over the Gulf of Mexico, on purpose-ish.

Starship lifted off from the Texas Starbase looking flawless, and you can see the full stack here, 124 meters of the most powerful rocket ever built. The plan was historic, catch both stages for the first time ever. The booster had other ideas. It diverted away from the launch pad, steered out over the Gulf, and blew up over the water. These are the pictures. SpaceX's own Dan Huot admitted they're not sure why they couldn't bring it back.

Here's the twist though, the top half is doing great. The spacecraft reached orbit, dropped off 26 Starlink satellites, and comes home Saturday for a catch attempt with mechanical arms. That's never been done.

Elon Musk wants weekly launches by early 2027, with billions of NASA money riding on this and the Moon program behind it. One stage down, one still flying. Saturday tells us which half of this rocket SpaceX actually figured out.

This is Liu Yang, reporting for HIT.