Footage has captured debris from Elon Musk’s SpaceX Starship obliterating a minivan parked nearby.
SpaceX launched the most powerful rocket ever built on Thursday, shortly before it exploded into a million pieces mid-air.
The Dodge Caravan was parked in a lot near Boca Chica Boulevard, a quarter of a mile away from the launch site, but that didn’t protect it from the debris that rained over it.
Although Starship exploded shortly after take-off, SpaceX celebrated the launch as a success.
In fact, SpaceX said a key milestone for the launch was just “clearing the launch pad”, saying any further success would be a “bonus”.
Musk himself Tweeted the rocket had about a 50 percent chance of reaching orbit, adding “I’m not saying it will get to orbit but I am guaranteeing excitement”.
And excitement they delivered, because this launch was wild.
Not only did the rocket explode shortly after take-off, but the thrust generated from the rocket’s engines was so forceful that it basically obliterated the concrete pad beneath it.
The footage taken by LabPadre shows massive chunks of concrete flying through the air as the rocket launched.
So, it’s not really surprising that it flew 1100 feet away and into the nearby Dodge.
Footage shows massive chunks of debris flying into the van, blowing out its windows and taillights.
The van’s D-Pillar is also destroyed and the liftgate is all but demolished.
The damage caused by the flying debris undoubtedly rendered the van little more than junk.
You can watch it all unfold here:
The minivan even appears to be decked out with cameras to capture footage of the launch too.
So, they obviously didn’t predict debris would fly as far as it did.
Unfortunately, it looks like the cameras, which were likely worth a lot of money, were hit and destroyed by the debris too.
Despite all this, Musk congratulated the SpaceX team on “an exciting test launch of Starship”, saying they “learned a lot for the next test launch in a few months”.
