Several industrial flights were diverted or delayed after SpaceX's Starship rocket broke apart during its seventh flight test on Thursday.
According to flight tracker Flightradar24, dozens of flights were affected.
The Federal Aviation Administration said it “briefly slowed and steered aircraft around the area where debris was falling from spacecraft” after warning pilots of “a dangerous area for falling debris from spacecraft rockets.”
The rocket lifted off from the SpaceX facility near Brownsville, Texas, shortly after 5:30 p.m. ET and flew east from Texas. It dissipated and SpaceX said on X that it would “continue to review data from today's flight test to better understand the root cause.”
The FAA has not received any reports of injuries or property damage from Starship's debris, an agency spokesperson told CNBC.
A JetBlue Airways According to FlightAware, one other flight tracking site, the flight from Fort Lauderdale, Florida, to San Juan, Puerto Rico was diverted back to Fort Lauderdale nearly two hours after the flight began. JetBlue didn’t immediately reply to a request for comment.
Other flights near Turks and Caicos, including a FedEx According to flight tracking data, a cargo plane appeared to show around while a Spirit Airlines plane also modified course.
The airlines and SpaceX didn’t immediately reply to requests for comment on the disruptions.
A American Airlines A spokeswoman said the airline had made fewer than 10 diversions because of the issue.
Airlines and other industrial flights in addition to private aircraft compete for airspace, particularly within the Florida metropolitan area.
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