The recent problems have led some observers to doubt whether the world’s biggest and most powerful launch vehicle will be capable of taking humans back to the Moon -- or achieving Musk’s dreams of colonizing Mars.
However around 15 minutes before lift-off, SpaceX scrubbed the flight, which is a relatively common event for space launches.
SpaceX did not immediately announce a new launch date, but a countdown on the company’s website suggested there would be another attempt at the same time on Monday evening.
The hour-long mission had been planned to put the rocket’s upper stage through a series of trials before the lower stage booster splashed down in the Indian Ocean.
SpaceX had also earlier flagged a “technical update on Starship” which did not appear to take place.
Starship is central to billionaire SpaceX founder Musk’s ambition of colonizing Mars, while NASA is counting on a modified version to return Americans to the Moon.
Two of the failed tests sent debris raining down over Caribbean islands, while the other reached space before breaking up. Then in June, another upper stage exploded on the ground during a “static fire” test.
After an investigation into the previous failed flight in May, SpaceX said it would “intentionally stress the structural limits” of the upper stage, in the hopes of sounding out a successful return.
The company’s “fail fast, learn fast” ethos has long been credited with its remarkable track record, giving the US company a commanding global lead in launches thanks to its Falcon rocket family.
‘Lot of pressure’
“I think there is a lot of pressure on this mission,“ he said. “We’ve had so many tests and it hasn’t proven itself reliable -- the successes have not exceeded the failures.”
The world’s richest man has staked the company’s future on Starship, planning to eventually retire its current generation of rockets and spacecraft in favor of the new system.
Still, SpaceX is pressing ahead, increasing the frequency of launches despite criticism from environmental groups over ecological impacts.- AFP
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