SpaceX Raptor engine test ends with fiery explosion

A SpaceX test stand at the company’s facilities in McGregor, Texas caught fire while testing Raptor 2 engines on the afternoon of May 23. NASA spaceflightThe engine had a malfunction that caused fumes to leak out, causing a secondary explosion. The news organization’s live broadcast showed the engine stopping before the fire began and the platform was eventually engulfed in flames and smoke.

SpaceX uses Raptor engines in the Starship’s extra-heavy booster system and upper stage spacecraft. They use liquid methane and liquid oxygen as fuel, and are designed to be powerful enough to be able to send spacecraft to the Moon and Mars. like Gizmodo It is suggested that mixing of gases due to a leak or similar anomaly could have caused the explosion, although SpaceX has not yet officially addressed what happened during the test.

The company is currently preparing for the fourth test flight of Starship, which is scheduled for June 5, pending regulatory approval and barring inclement weather or other factors that could delay the launch. This explosion likely would not affect the flight’s launch window. SpaceX’s main goals for the fourth test flight are to ensure that the Super Heavy rocket gets a soft landing in the Gulf of Mexico and achieve a controlled entry for the Starship spacecraft. The company said it has made several hardware and software upgrades to incorporate what it learned from the third flight test. The upper stage of the spacecraft reached space during that flight, but… I was burned into the atmosphere upon re-entry, while its super-heavy booster broke apart in the final stages of its descent rather than quietly scattering into the ocean.