[imagesource:socialmedia]

On Sunday, a privately owned Chinese space rocket met a fiery demise near a bustling city.

During an ill-fated test launch, the rocket veered off course, crashing spectacularly and erupting into a massive fireball.

According to Beijing Tianbing, also known as Space Pioneer, the first stage of the Tianlong-3 rocket unexpectedly left its launch pad due to a structural failure at the connection between the rocket and the test stand.

Video footage of the incident showed the rocket soaring straight up into the air before losing power and turning horizontally, falling back down to earth and exploding into flames on nearby forested hills. In a statement on its official WeChat account, per The Guardian, the company reported that the rocket crash-landed in the hilly terrain of Gongyi, a city in central China.

Parts of the rocket stage were scattered within a “safe area” but caused a local fire, according to a separate statement from the Gongyi Emergency Management Bureau.

Per the initial investigation of the unplanned flight, there were no reports of casualties.

Wow. This is apparently what was supposed to be a STATIC FIRE TEST today of a Tianlong-3 first stage by China’s Space Pioneer. That’s catastrophic, not static. Firm was targeting an orbital launch in the coming months. https://t.co/BY9MgJeE7A pic.twitter.com/L6ronwLW1N

— Andrew Jones (@AJ_FI) June 30, 2024

The falling rocket scared the living hell out of some of the residents nearby:

The two-stage Tianlong-3, ‘Sky Dragon 3’, is a partly reusable rocket under development by Space Pioneer, one of a small group of private-sector rocket makers that have grown rapidly over the past five years.

Space Pioneer says the performance of Tianlong-3 is comparable to SpaceX’s Falcon 9, which is also a two-stage rocket.

[source:guardian]