Wednesday, November 8, 2017

SpaceX Loses Rocket Engine During Testing

Hawthorne-based SpaceX lost a Merlin rocket engine during testing over the weekend, the company disclosed on Wednesday, during a qualification test for the engine. Those Merlin engines are at the core of SpaceX's Falcon 9 rockets. Few details were available on the test, which occurred on Sunday. The test failure comes as SpaceX has had stunning success in launching a string of payloads into space, with fourteen successful launches so far in 2017. It's unclear if the engine failure will impact SpaceX's future scheduled launches.