SpaceX’s latest attempt to fly its Starship has again ended in a rapid unscheduled disassembly.

The Thursday mission, the eighth flight of the vehicle NASA has contracted to use for 2027 demo of a crewed Moon landing, aimed to nail an hour-long transatmospheric journey to the Indian Ocean that the previous launch could not achieve.

SpaceX attributed that mission’s failure to “harmonic response” several times stronger than the launcher-for-hire company had ever seen in testing. Those forces caused a leak in the propulsion system, causing a fire, and an explosion that saw chunks of Starship rain down over the Atlantic.

SpaceX pledged to upgrade the problematic parts but whatever changes it made didn’t stop Flight 8 from ending with the same explosive outcome.

As on Flight 7, the Super Heavy booster did its job, and Starship fired up its engines. But before the end of its ascent burn, SpaceX reported “an energet