When SpaceX’s “Starship” rocket exploded during its first test flight last year, there was not only a lot of fire and smoke, but also a part of the atmosphere changed. Researchers write in the journal “Geophysical Research Letters” that an unusually large hole was created at high altitude. It stretched for thousands of kilometers and existed for almost an hour.
According to the research, the hole is an area where the air has been neutralized. There, in the so-called ionosphere, at an altitude of about 60 to 1000 kilometers, electrically charged particles are normally present. The Starship flight reduced the number of these particles because the combustion of the rocket fuel led to charge exchange.
Lead author Yuri Yazyukevich of the Institute of Solar-Terrestrial Physics in Irkutsk, Russia, told Nature that the exhaust gases from various rockets could create temporary holes – but in this case the effect was particularly large, also because of the shock waves from the explosions.
The ionosphere responds to different things, the study continues. It can change during solar flares, large meteorites and events on the Earth’s surface such as earthquakes or volcanic eruptions. The effects of the “Starship” launch on the ionosphere are similar to those of large earthquakes or the eruption of the Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha’apai undersea volcano near the South Sea Kingdom of Tonga in 2022.
Yazyukevich was surprised by how much change the researchers could observe. “This means that we do not understand the processes that are happening in the atmosphere,” he explains. It is possible that such events will have an impact on satellite navigation in the future, for example for autonomous vehicles.
The most powerful rocket system ever
Starship is the largest and most powerful rocket system ever built. During the flight from Texas on November 18, 2023, the ‘Super Heavy’ engine broke apart after just three minutes and exploded shortly afterwards at an altitude of 90 kilometers. The upper stage continued to fly until 149 kilometers and also exploded. According to the investigation, the debris fell into the sea northeast of Puerto Rico.
To investigate the effects of the Starship flight and the explosions, the researchers used satellite-based navigation systems (GNSS). Receivers on the Earth’s surface communicate with satellites. The speed of certain electromagnetic waves changes with the number of electrical particles in the ionosphere.
Using these data, the researchers were able to determine that the number of electric particles in a region decreased after the launch. The disturbances spread in a V-shape towards the north, up to a distance of 2,000 kilometers. “This seems to be the first discovery of a non-chemical ionospheric hole caused by a man-made explosion,” they conclude.
The first flight was followed by further unmanned launches of ‘Starships’ from the private space company of technology billionaire Elon Musk. During the fourth test in June, the giant rocket flew in space for half an hour before making a controlled landing. The spaceship and rocket are intended to be reusable in the future. ‘Starship’ is intended to enable manned missions to the moon and Mars.
Source: Krone
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