The Federal Aviation Administration has joined officials in Turks and Caicos in investigating damage apparently caused by debris from the breakup of SpaceX's rocket during a test flight on Thursday. The FAA has grounded the Starship rocket in the meantime, NBC News reports. No injuries have been reported, the agency said. Dozens of flights were diverted because of the debris scattering over parts of the Caribbean and Atlantic Ocean after the launch in Boca Chica, Texas. Elon Musk's company has been ordered to take the lead in the investigation of the failure, per CNN. The FAA will review the findings, then list steps SpaceX must take before Starship flights can resume.
Musk posted on X that early indications were that the problem involved an "oxygen/fuel leak in the cavity above the ship engine firewall," per the BBC. "It felt like an earthquake," said a resident of the British territory's Providenciales island. "It was scary ... all of the people here in our apartment ran to the parking lot." A woman who was working in South Caicos when the debris fell there said: "My mirror and the walls were shaking. It was like when you're on an airplane ... my ears were rattling." A tennis instructor saw debris land on a court and feared it was a meteorite. "It kept exploding and exploding and exploding," he said.
Turks and Caicos officials have not released specific information about property damage. They advised anyone who encounters the debris not to touch it for safety reasons, pointing out that it belongs to SpaceX. A seismology expert told CNN that the resulting sonic booms, in addition to impact of the debris, could have caused damage. (More SpaceX stories.)
,
uBlock 
,
and
Ghostery 
)
