Elon Musk has a peculiar way of defining “success.” Let’s review the video, shall we?
The world’s largest-ever rocket blasted off from its launch pad in South Texas on Thursday. About four minutes into the flight and far from achieving Earth orbit, the rocket exploded. It burst into a zillion pieces.
What did the world’s richest individual call it? A success!
Which makes me wonder how Elon Musk defines the term. He said the ship cleared the launch pad, which was good enough for him to declare that the failed mission was, um, a successful one. And in the most euphemistic phrase possible, the Musk team described the explosion as an “unexpected disassembly.”
Go … figure.
The only thing that saved this even from being an unmitigated disaster was that there were no human beings aboard the rocket.
Musk’s rocket, the SpaceX, aims to ferry humans to the moon and he, and the rest of us hope, far beyond into the solar system.
The South Texas launch was not a success, no matter how much money SpaceX’s owner has at his disposal.
Scientists have plenty of work to do to make this ship suitable to carry priceless human cargo. Get to work … and fix the problem!