SpaceX’s latest Starship prototype fails under pressure testing

SpaceX’s latest Starship prototype fails under pressure testing

4 years ago
Anonymous $9CO2RSACsf

https://techcrunch.com/2020/04/03/spacexs-latest-starship-prototype-fails-under-pressure-testing/

The process of designing, testing and building an entirely new spacecraft is definitely a difficult one, and bound to encounter some issues. SpaceX’s efforts to build Starship, its massive new fully reusable spaceship, is no exception. The most recent Starship prototype, designated “SN3,” failed catastrophically during cryogenic proof testing, which is designed to simulate pressures the spacecraft would encounter during a test flight.

That might sound familiar: SpaceX’s first prototype, the Mk1, was also destroyed during pressure testing of its fuel tank, and the next full-scale prototype under development, SN1, was also destroyed during a pressure test in late February. Another prototype, SN2, was stripped to just a test article designed for cryogenic testing, and it passed that same cryo test, but now the next full-scale prototype being developed, SN3, has once again succumbed during cryogenic testing at SpaceX’s launch stand in Boca Chica, Texas.