Watch: SpaceX Starship spins out of control in Elon Musk’s latest test flight

Elon Musk's SpaceX Starship rocket spun out of control around halfway through its flight on Tuesday, 27 May, without achieving some of its most important testing goals.

The 400-foot-tall (122-metre) rocket system lifted off from the Texas launch site and flew beyond the point of two previous explosive attempts from earlier in 2025.

Contact was lost with the 232-foot lower-stage booster during its descent before it plunged into the sea instead of a controlled splashdown, rather than making the controlled splashdown the company had planned.

Starship began to spin uncontrollably around 30 minutes into the mission after SpaceX cancelled a plan to deploy eight mock Starlink satellites into space as the rocket's dispenser-like mechanism failed to operate as intended.