Explosion of SpaceX’s Rocket Left a Hole in the Atmosphere in First of Its Kind Occurrence

On November 18, 2023, SpaceX launched its massive Starship rocket from Boca Chica, Texas, but it exploded shortly after separating from the upper stage, about 90 kilometers above the Gulf of Mexico. A few minutes later, the upper stage’s self-destruct system had activated, causing a second explosion at a height of 150 kilometers.

Russian scientists later discovered the drastic impact of the explosion that created a gaping hole in the ionosphere, which is a part of the atmosphere filled with charged particles. Despite this, many did not see the explosion as a major setback. NASA Administrator Bill Nelson tweeted, "Every great achievement throughout history has demanded some level of calculated risk because with great risk comes great reward."

Knewz.com noted that a co-author of the study that revealed the effects of the explosion, Yury Yasyukevich had examined data from over 2,500 ground stations in North America and the Caribbean. The team had found that the Starship explosions had created shock waves moving faster than sound, temporarily causing a hole in the ionosphere for nearly an hour. The hole wasn't as large as the one caused by the Tongan volcano eruption in 2022, but it was bigger than the one made by a meteor near Chelyabinsk, Russia, in 2013.

Kosuke Heki, a geophysicist at Hokkaido University in Sapporo, Japan, told Nature that he was impressed by the case study. He also believed that the large explosion's chemical effects had been the hole's primary cause. The hole had extended from Mexico’s Yucatán Peninsula to the southeastern part of the United States. Although rocket explosions often create ionospheric holes, the shock waves in this case had been especially dramatic.

Some critics blamed SpaceX for conducting such experiments, citing concerns that disturbances in the ionosphere could significantly affect satellite navigation, communications, and radio astronomy. But NASA’s program manager for the Artemis lunar landing system, Lisa Watson-Morgan, told The Time Magazine , "That’s why we test, you know. You learn more from a test that doesn’t go well than from one that does, and then you regroup and go again."

This was the second time one of SpaceX's 400-foot-tall rockets exploded during testing. The first explosion occurred on April 20, 2022, when the rocket had been given a self-destruct code about 4 minutes after takeoff due to an uncontrolled spin 18 miles (29 km) above the ground. Debris from the rocket had fallen to Earth, leading to a federal investigation and a lawsuit filed by environmental groups.

However, on March 14, 2023, the Starship successfully reached orbit in its third test flight but got lost in the Indian Ocean during its reentry to Earth. Yasyukevich had told TASS via Live Science , "By analyzing the data and understanding their nature, we can better understand the structure of the ionosphere and the phenomena that occur within it."

SpaceX's communications manager, Dan Huot, said during the company's live stream of the launch, "The team had confirmed that the ship had been lost, so no splashdown today. But again, it's incredible to see how much further we had gotten this time around." Elon Musk's SpaceX plans to use Starship rockets to carry people, spacecraft, satellites, and cargo to different locations in the solar system for NASA and their missions in the future.