"Preliminary indication is that we had an oxygen/fuel leak in the cavity above the ship engine firewall that was large enough to build pressure in excess of the vent capacity."

Flawed rocket launches by SpaceX and Blue Origin still leave both companies in position to dominate the space sector.

SpaceX confirmed the upper stage had undergone "rapid unscheduled disassembly," the company's euphemism for an explosion.

The U.S. Federal Aviation Administration and officials from the Turks and Caicos Islands have launched probes into SpaceX's explosive Starship rocket test that sent debris streaking over the northern Caribbean and forced airlines to divert dozens of flights.

Blue Origin scored a major win with its New Glenn rocket launch, but SpaceX still leads the space industry with a Falcon fleet and upcoming Starship.

The US has grounded SpaceX's giant Starship rocket while an investigation is carried out into why it exploded during its latest test flight. The rocket's upper stage dramatically broke up and disintegrated over the Caribbean after launching from Texas on Thursday,

The incident in which a SpaceX rocket broke up after launch demonstrates the challenges the FAA will face as the number of commercial space flights increases.

The uncrewed Starship spacecraft was apparently destroyed during its first flight launch of 2025 that blasted off from south Texas.

The Super Heavy booster, meanwhile, was successfully caught in the launch tower's mechanical arms for only the second time

While the Starship is lost, the mission's first-stage booster successfully returned to the launch tower, where it was caught by the tower's robotic arms.

One just launched the world’s biggest rocket, with mixed success. The other makes small model rockets for hobbyists, and it's stockpiling supplies ahead of Trump's tariffs.