马斯克的火箭又炸了！SpaceX星舰第二次试飞失败
A prototype of SpaceX's Starship rocket exploded during a landing attempt minutes after a high-altitude experimental launch from Boca Chica, Texas, on Tuesday, in a repeat of an accident that destroyed a previous test rocket.
The Starship SN9 that blew up on its final descent, like the SN8 before it, was a test model of the heavy-lift rocket being developed by billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk's private space company to carry humans and 100 tonnes of cargo on future missions to the moon and Mars.
这趟“短暂”的飞行试验持续了6分26秒。通过现场直播可以看到，这枚自导的星舰火箭从墨西哥湾沿岸发射台升空，并在第5分钟冲上了10000米的高空，接连完成空中转弯等特技动作，可惜在返回阶段出现剧烈抖动，最终在触地前数秒发生爆炸。
发射现场火光冲天，火箭成了一团火球。
The self-guided, 16-story-tall rocket initially soared into the clear, blue South Texas sky from its Gulf Coast launch pad on what appeared from SpaceX's livestream coverage to be a flawless liftoff.
Reaching its peak altitude of about 10 kilometers, the spacecraft then hovered momentarily in midair, shut off its engines and executed a planned "belly-flop" maneuver to descend nose-down under aerodynamic control back toward the Earth.
The trouble came when the Starship, after flipping its nose upward again to begin its landing sequence, tried to reactivate two of its three Raptor thrusters, but one failed to ignite. The rocket then fell rapidly to the ground in a roaring ball of flames, smoke and debris – 6 minutes and 26 seconds after launch. No injuries were reported.
据SpaceX工程师在试飞直播中介绍，火箭在大部分测试飞行中 “看起来非常稳定”，且达到了大约10公里的高度，“只是需要在着陆上多做一点努力”。
他表示，工程师将仔细检查从测试中收集的数据以了解出现问题的原因，并会在不久后“带着另一艘飞船回归。”
据悉，SpaceX计划用星际飞船系列搭载宇航员前往月球和火星并执行货运任务。
A SpaceX commentator for Tuesday's launch webcast said the rocket's flight to its test altitude "looked very good and stable, like we saw last December."
"We just have to work on that landing a little bit," the commentator said, adding, "This is a test flight, the second time we've flown Starship in this configuration."
He said SpaceX engineers would pore through data collected from the test to determine what went wrong, and "we'll be back with another Starship in the near future."
探索浩瀚宇宙深空，最终实现“在火星上退休”的终极梦想，是马斯克制造宇宙飞船的无限动力，然而，这条前往火星之路并非坦途。
实际上，这次测试的星舰SN9号原型已经是SpaceX公司第二次试射的星舰原型机。首次试射的原型SN8于当地时间2020年12月9日实施发射。遗憾的是，两者结局十分相似，都在着陆时发生了爆炸并解体。
而在SN8之前，先后共有6艘原型星舰在测试中“壮烈牺牲”。其中，既有地面点火事故，也有舰体结构强度测试事故等等。
数次失败让人对马斯克的雄心壮志渐失信心，但他并不气馁。
在SN8爆炸当天，马斯克仍然发推庆祝SpaceX任务的“胜利”：
在此之前，马斯克已经做好了“可能会失败”的心理准备。
尽管如此，他仍然在按照自己规划好的日程表一步步迈进：在SN8爆炸发生的两个月后，他发推宣称，将在今年晚些时候进行首次全民用轨道太空飞行。
The Starship SN8, the first prototype to fly in a high-altitude test launch, met a similar fate in December.
The complete Starship rocket, which will stand 120 meters tall when mated with its super-heavy first-stage booster, is the company's next-generation fully reusable launch vehicle – the center of Musk's ambitions to make human space travel more affordable and routine.
The rocket system is partially funded by NASA and could end up being offered to the U.S. military.
The first orbital flight of Starship is planned for the end of this year, and Musk has said he intends to fly Japanese billionaire Yusaku Maezawa around the moon and back with the Starship in 2023.