A thankfully unmanned commercial rocket headed for the International Space Station to deliver much needed supplies exploded just after launching Tuesday, filling the sky with a massive, depressing fireball of failure.
The Antares rocket being supplied by contractor Orbital Sciences blew up moments after its liftoff at NASA’s facility on Eastern Virginia’s shore. The explosion destroyed the rocket and spacecraft and immediately brought NASA’s reliance on private commercial ventures to carry its payloads to the space station.
NASA and Orbital Sciences were apparently gathering data to determine the cause of the failure of the Orbital CRS-3, the space agency said. No injuries were reported.
Orbital Sciences tweeted this following the embarrassing flub.
There has been a vehicle anomaly.
Um, duh. Then later they Tweeted this.
The vehicle suffered a catastrophic failure.
America’s space program has fallen ridiculously behind the pace it once set. Trips to the moon no longer captivate the American public like they once did. Fatal explosions on both the Challenger and Columbia will forever be etched in our collective mind as a national moment of solidarity and mourning. Despite the fact that this rocket was unmanned it still carries with it the stigma of another NASA failure and unfortunately major news outlets picked up on it as a major story, thus highlighting it even further. The PR for this incident will be much easier to deal with than the space shuttle disasters, but it’s still another black eye on a dwindling space program.
The now famous, “It’s gonna be loud…” video that went viral.
Another video
Another video