SpaceX's Mars rocket Starship enters space but signal lost and explosion feared


Sarwat Nasir
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SpaceX's Starship entered space for the first time after a launch from a Texas pad on Saturday, but no data was recovered after it reportedly blew up.

The Starship rocket system, consisting of a booster and the Starship craft, blasted off from Boca Chica, Texas, on its second test flight.

It reached further than the first attempt in April, with the booster separating successfully, but it also exploded moments after.

SpaceX founder Elon Musk was in mission control to monitor the launch.

The company said the goal was to send the spacecraft to a suborbital trajectory, but it is not clear yet what altitude it managed to reach.

Saturday's test was meant to show Starship's ability to reach orbit before SpaceX begins commercial operations.

What happened with the first attempt?

The first orbital launch attempt failed because of a technical issue.

Engineers had to deliberately blow up the rocket mid flight when the second stage failed to separate from the booster.

Chunks of Starship tumbled back to Earth after engineers ordered a “rapid unplanned disassembly” – a process that automatically disintegrates the rocket.

It reached a peak altitude of 39km over the Gulf of Mexico when the mishap took place.

Mr Musk had said at the time that the flight still gave them “plenty of data” to try again.

'Starship’s first flight test provided numerous lessons learnt that directly contributed to several upgrades to both the vehicle and ground infrastructure to improve the probability of success on future flights," SpaceX said.

"The second flight test will debut a hot-stage separation system and a new electronic thrust vector control (TVC) system for Super Heavy Raptor engines, in addition to reinforcements to the pad foundation and a water-cooled steel flame deflector, among many other enhancements."

SpaceX said that technologies are already used in its Falcon rocket, Dragon capsule and Starlink satellites.

Elon Musk hopes to make life multiplanetary

SpaceX claims that Starship is the most powerful launch vehicle yet developed.

It is able to produce 3,991 tonnes of thrust, which is 15 per cent more than Nasa’s Apollo Moon rocket Saturn V.

The company has been contracted by Nasa to develop the Starship Human Landing System, which will one day help astronauts land on the Moon under the US space agency’s Artemis programme.

But Mr Musk's long-term goal is to eventually send astronauts to Mars using his Starship fleets, helping to “make life multiplanetary”.

He has already sold seats on the rocket, including to Japanese billionaire Yusaku Maezawa, who hopes to fly on the first crewed flight to the Moon while taking eight artists with him as part of his dearMoon programme.

American billionaire Jared Isaacman is also working with SpaceX through his Polaris programme, a series of privately led space missions.

Mr Isaacman will be commander on the Polaris III mission, the first crewed orbital flight on the Starship rocket.

UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
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Russia's Muslim Heartlands

Dominic Rubin, Oxford

Thor: Ragnarok

Dir: Taika Waititi

Starring: Chris Hemsworth, Tom Hiddleston, Cate Blanchett, Jeff Goldblum, Mark Ruffalo, Tessa Thompson

Four stars

if you go

The flights

Emirates have direct flights from Dubai to Glasgow from Dh3,115. Alternatively, if you want to see a bit of Edinburgh first, then you can fly there direct with Etihad from Abu Dhabi.

The hotel

Located in the heart of Mackintosh's Glasgow, the Dakota Deluxe is perhaps the most refined hotel anywhere in the city. Doubles from Dh850

 Events and tours

There are various Mackintosh specific events throughout 2018 – for more details and to see a map of his surviving designs see glasgowmackintosh.com

For walking tours focussing on the Glasgow Style, see the website of the Glasgow School of Art. 

More information

For ideas on planning a trip to Scotland, visit www.visitscotland.com

Day 5, Abu Dhabi Test: At a glance

Moment of the day When Dilruwan Perera dismissed Yasir Shah to end Pakistan’s limp resistance, the Sri Lankans charged around the field with the fevered delirium of a side not used to winning. Trouble was, they had not. The delivery was deemed a no ball. Sri Lanka had a nervy wait, but it was merely a stay of execution for the beleaguered hosts.

Stat of the day – 5 Pakistan have lost all 10 wickets on the fifth day of a Test five times since the start of 2016. It is an alarming departure for a side who had apparently erased regular collapses from their resume. “The only thing I can say, it’s not a mitigating excuse at all, but that’s a young batting line up, obviously trying to find their way,” said Mickey Arthur, Pakistan’s coach.

The verdict Test matches in the UAE are known for speeding up on the last two days, but this was extreme. The first two innings of this Test took 11 sessions to complete. The remaining two were done in less than four. The nature of Pakistan’s capitulation at the end showed just how difficult the transition is going to be in the post Misbah-ul-Haq era.

History's medical milestones

1799 - First small pox vaccine administered

1846 - First public demonstration of anaesthesia in surgery

1861 - Louis Pasteur published his germ theory which proved that bacteria caused diseases

1895 - Discovery of x-rays

1923 - Heart valve surgery performed successfully for first time

1928 - Alexander Fleming discovers penicillin

1953 - Structure of DNA discovered

1952 - First organ transplant - a kidney - takes place 

1954 - Clinical trials of birth control pill

1979 - MRI, or magnetic resonance imaging, scanned used to diagnose illness and injury.

1998 - The first adult live-donor liver transplant is carried out

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The five pillars of Islam

1. Fasting 

2. Prayer 

3. Hajj 

4. Shahada 

5. Zakat 

Updated: November 18, 2023, 4:02 PM`