The rocket is a colossal feat, an outrageous beast whose first stage is equipped with at least 33 engines, second stage powered by a whopping 9 engines.

• Space X test flights its mammoth rocket dubbed the Starship on April 20th, in Texas
• It’s the world’s biggest and most powerful rocket ever fashioned into man’s world
• Starship is the most complex machine ever built
• The rocket exploded after approximately 4 minutes after take off

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Rockets soar and rockets explode. Test flights are usually marred in technical controversies.

Space X, the private US company that builds rockets into space, test flight its mammoth rocket dubbed the Starship on April 20th in Texas. And well, things didn’t really pan out well as we’ve seen in its most successful falcon 9 rocket flights.

The 40 storey, gigantic rocket revered to take man to Mars in the future, blew up over the Gulf of Mexico, four minutes after take off after having covered around 39 km (24 miles) off the ground.

It’s the world’s biggest and most powerful rocket ever fashioned into man’s world. 

The rocket is a colossal feat, an outrageous beast whose first stage is equipped with at least 33 engines, second stage powered by a whopping 9 engines.

But while public opinion is split with some calling the test a failure – due to Space X’s successful track record with its falcon 9, and others calling it a success – by drawing comparison with test flights in history, and few others caught in the web of ambivalence, we take a deep dive to unmask why we think Space X’s rocket explosion is no big deal.

Rockets are built to be tested for vulnerabilities on maiden flights.

It’ll be very difficult to name a single rocket built in history that did not blow up or malfunction in its test flights.

For example, the Atlas rocket that carried John Glenn around the Earth’s orbit in 1962 had exploded in half of its uncrewed test flights.

Similarly, the Gemini 3 spacecraft that carried Gus Grissom and John Young had previously failed in more than 10 of its initial flights.

Space X itself is no new comer to this reality in the space continuum. The company’s most successful rocket, falcon 9, which has flown 217 successful from 2010  had to brace 3 initial launch failures.

Starship is the most complex machine ever built

Talk of complexity and no rocket comes nigh. As if the Starship was deliberately built to trip up seasoned engineers, several experts have expressed shock over the menacing size of the rocket.

To elevate your consciousness to perceive the “success rate” of this beast of a rocket, let’s take a quick stroll down the annals of history.

In 1969, the Soviet Union carried out one of man’s audacious test flights. They launched their N1 moon rocket which had just 30 engines. The rocket blew up immediately after launch causing the biggest rocket explosion in the history of man. The rocket collapsed back to the ground and raptured the launch pad.

Space X’s Starship had more than 33 engines in its first stage making it an intricate engineering monster.

And come to think of it, the 40-storey beast lifted off the launch pad, boosted into the air for several minutes before failing to separate for successive trajectory. And none of its 33+ engines was reported burned. Impressive stuff!

Space X’s goals were modest

Elon Musk, founder and CEO of Space X

The engineers at Space X aren’t new to the space launch custom. Test flights, especially maiden test flights, are wrapped in technical problems. So they didn’t dither on their initial goals.

One of their main goals was to ensure that launch tower was cleared and pad kept intact. And this, they achieved!

“Starship has cleared the pad and beach! Vehicle is on a nominal flight path”.

Rocket explosion was anticipated

Starship explodes after few minutes of flight

Although the world’s first private space company, Space X has garnered some experience under her armpit. Rocket explosions in test flights aren’t new.

Engineers build, test and explosion occurs consistently until it finally gets pegged perfectly. So Space X wasn’t blinded in the fool’s world of idealism despite the fact that Musk’s fascination with the Starship is quite contagious.

According to John Logsdon, professor emeritus and founder of the George Washington University Space Policy Institute, the explosion “was something that SpaceX anticipated as a realistic possibility,”

He believed Space X “did a very good job of lowering expectations prior to the launch.” 

“They realized that testing a complex system like this, there are multiple things that can go wrong. And something did.”

Future tests expected

The SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket sits on launch pad 39A at Kennedy Space Center

The popular adage goes that one only fails if one fails to try again. When it comes to Elon Musk’s Space X, failure is a delicacy as his companies are known for not giving up and eventually breaking boundaries. Well, that props Tesla into mind. Isn’t it? From nowhere, it overtook the likes of Toyota in valuation.

The company played down the explosive incident as just a “rapid unscheduled disassembly“. That’s quite a catchy expression to save face though. Isn’t it?

But truth be told, even the most seasoned Soviet engineers couldn’t lift a 30-engine rocket off the launch pad without rupturing the entire structure. Compared to space X, a private relatively inexperienced company, it’s one giant leap.

But what’s more important is what to come in the months ahead. Lessons have been learned and we expect Space X to jump back in vigor. Musk tweeted that,

“Learned a lot for next test launch in a few months.”

For now, we keep fingers crossed and expectations relatively high as we earnestly await the next test flight in months away.

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