SpaceX's ongoing mission to prepare Starship spacecraft for trips to the moon and, eventually, Mars suffered a setback when a spacecraft exploded this week in South Texas. The explosion happened during what SpaceX called routine testing in preparation for Starship's 10th flight since 2023, which was expected to happen later this month.

The last three Starship flight tests ended with explosions. Now, Starship has exploded before even leaving the launch pad.

A SpaceX Starship experienced a catastrophic explosion while positioned on a Starbase test stand in Texas preparing for a static fire test.