Pilot declared ‘Mayday’ after flying through debris in January 2025
Lily Shanagher
The explosion of a SpaceX rocket earlier this year endangered multiple passenger planes; one pilot declared “Mayday” before being forced to fly through the debris.
An experimental rocket ship owned by Elon Musk’s company broke apart minutes after takeoff in January, scattering fiery debris across the Caribbean region and causing widespread disruption to air traffic.
Pilots of three planes carrying a total of 450 people had to decide whether to fly through the area of rocket debris or risk running low on fuel over water, according to Federal Aviation Administration documents.
files, which Wall StreetJournal When examined, it turned out that the explosion on January 16 posed a greater danger to aircraft in the air than the public knew.
The explosion rained a meteor-like shower of debris onto parts of the Caribbean for about 50 minutes and could have put lives at risk, the FAA said.
Fiery trails were visible in the sky from the cockpits and cabins of commercial airliners and private jets. If a piece of debris had struck an aircraft during flight, it could have caused serious damage to the aircraft and possible passenger fatalities.
Eventually all flights landed safely.
The uncrewed Starship test flight was Musk’s seventh attempt to launch a rocket ship into space in his quest to make life on Mars a reality. Responding to the outburst, the billionaire posted on social media: “Success is uncertain but fun is guaranteed!”
During the incident, an air traffic controller told a JetBlue flight bound for Puerto Rico: “If you want to go to San Juan, you will do so at your own risk.”
Two others, a private jet and an Iberia Airlines plane, also declared a fuel emergency and passed through the temporary no-fly zone. WSJ reported.
A controller in Puerto Rico told pilots they had to declare an emergency to land in the capital. One pilot responded: “So we’re declaring an emergency: A Mayday. Mayday, Mayday.”
According to an FAA report from an air traffic facility in New York, air traffic controllers working on the issue had to try to steer planes away from debris fields, increasing their workload and causing a “potential undue safety risk.”
At least two planes were flying too close to each other, requiring a controller to intervene to avoid a collision, the documents said.
Besides the extreme safety risk, the FAA also noted that SpaceX did not call the emergency line immediately after the explosion. Controllers in Miami first heard about the explosion not from Musk’s company, but from pilots who saw the wreckage.
Space The company said the 121-meter-tall Starship is the most powerful rocket ever developed.
The explosion alarmed the airline industry and U.S. government officials due to its impact on air travel and the growing number of space operations.
The safety risk of debris will continue to increase. The FAA predicts there will be an annual average of 200 to 400 rocket launches or re-entry in the coming years, compared to an average of 24 operations each year between 1989 and 2024.
Following the incident in January, the agency established an expert panel to conduct a safety review to examine how to deal with debris risks from spaceflight failures.
FAA officials suspended the review in August, claiming that most of the safety recommendations had already been implemented. The unusual move surprised panel members.
Since the explosion in January, SpaceX has made four more Starship launches, two successful and two unsuccessful.
During testing in March, the engines failed shortly after liftoff, causing the rocket to spin out of control and explode in mid-air. In May, the rocket went out of control and broke up in the Indian Ocean near its intended splashdown location.
The company plans to release a new, more powerful version next year. Musk had already predicted there would be problems. He said in a podcast in September that he warned that the rocket “may have some teething pains initially because it’s such a radical redesign.”
London Telegram He approached SpaceX for comment.
Telegraph, London
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