{"id":65386,"date":"2025-06-18T23:59:00","date_gmt":"2025-06-18T23:59:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/?p=65386"},"modified":"2025-06-24T02:06:16","modified_gmt":"2025-06-24T02:06:16","slug":"explosion-of-spacex-starship-at-the-starbase-launch-facility-in-texas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/archives\/65386","title":{"rendered":"Explosion of SpaceX Starship at the Starbase launch facility in Texas"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><div style=\"width: 3004px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/images\/2025\/06\/250618_goes19_nearInfrared_shortwaveInfrared_Starship_explosion_TX.mp4\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium\" src=\"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/images\/2025\/06\/250619_0401utc_4panel_Starship.png\" width=\"2994\" height=\"1668\" \/><\/a><p class=\"wp-caption-text\">5-minute GOES-19 Near-Infrared (0.87 \u00b5m, 1.61 \u00b5m and 2.25 \u00b5m) and Shortwave Infrared (3.9 \u00b5m) images, from 0356-0426 UTC on 19 June [click to play MP4 animation]<\/p><\/div>5-minute CONUS Sector GOES-19 <em>(GOES-East)<\/em> Near-Infrared and Shortwave Infrared images <em><strong>(above)<\/strong><\/em> showed thermal signatures of an explosion of SpaceX Starship at the Starbase launch facility in South Texas that occurred at 0401 UTC on 19 June or 11:01 PM CDT on 18 June 2025 (<a href=\"https:\/\/www.nasaspaceflight.com\/2025\/06\/ship-36-anomaly-engine-testing\/\"><strong>NASASpaceflight.com article<\/strong><\/a>).<\/p>\n<p>The resulting large fire was hot enough to be flagged as a Processed Fire by the GOES-19 <a href=\"http:\/\/rammb.cira.colostate.edu\/training\/visit\/training_sessions\/goes_r_fire_surface_properties\/video\/presentation_html5.html?lms=1\"><strong>Fire Detection and Characterization Algorithm<\/strong><\/a> (FDCA), with a Fire Power value of 46.85 MW at 0401 UTC <em><strong>(below)<\/strong><\/em>.<\/p>\n<p><div style=\"width: 3004px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/images\/2025\/06\/250619_0401utc_goes19_fireMask_firePower_Starship.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium\" src=\"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/images\/2025\/06\/250619_0401utc_goes19_fireMask_firePower_Starship.png\" width=\"2994\" height=\"1668\" \/><\/a><p class=\"wp-caption-text\">GOES-19 Near-Infrared (0.87 \u00b5m, 1.61 \u00b5m and 2.25 \u00b5m) and Shortwave Infrared (3.9 \u00b5m) images with an overlay (and cursor sample) of the FDCA Fire Power and Fire Mask at 0401 UTC on 19 June [click to enlarge]<\/p><\/div>The <a href=\"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/ngfs\/\"><strong>Next Generation Fire System<\/strong><\/a> (NGFS) also displayed GOES-19 Fire Detection polygons <em><strong>(below)<\/strong><\/em> &#8212; beginning at 0401 UTC, the time of the Starship explosion.<\/p>\n<p><div style=\"width: 3244px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/images\/2025\/06\/250619_g19_rgb_ngfsFireDetectioms_Starship.mp4\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium\" src=\"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/images\/2025\/06\/250619_0401utc_goes19_rgb_ngfs_Starship.png\" width=\"3234\" height=\"2112\" \/><\/a><p class=\"wp-caption-text\">5-minute GOES-19 Microphysics RGB images with an overlay of NGFS Fire Detection polygons, from 0356-0426 UTC on 19 June [click to play MP4 animation]<\/p><\/div>A cursor probe of a GOES-19 NGFS Fire Detection pixel at 0401 UTC is shown below.<\/p>\n<p><div style=\"width: 3012px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/images\/2025\/06\/250619_0401utc_goes19_microphysicsRGB_ngfsFireDetection_cursor_sample_Starship.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium\" src=\"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/images\/2025\/06\/250619_0401utc_goes19_microphysicsRGB_ngfsFireDetection_cursor_sample_Starship.png\" width=\"3002\" height=\"1874\" \/><\/a><p class=\"wp-caption-text\">GOES-19 Microphysics RGB image with a cursor probe of a NGFS Fire Detection pixel at 0406 UTC on 19 June [click to enlarge]<\/p><\/div>In spite of its larger satellite viewing angle and less frequent 10-minute Full Disk scans over Texas, a distinct thermal signature (darker blue pixels) was still seen in a 0400 UTC GOES-18 <em>(GOES-West)<\/em> Microphysics RGB image <em><strong>(below)<\/strong><\/em>. The 0400 UTC GOES-18 Full Disk scan was viewing southeastern Texas around 0402-0403 UTC. There were no Full Disk sector NGFS polygons plotted on the GOES-18 RGB images, due their processing being restricted to Alaska and western Canada (for now).<\/p>\n<div style=\"width: 3012px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/images\/2025\/06\/250619_goes18_microphysicsRGB_Starship.mp4\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium\" src=\"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/images\/2025\/06\/250619_0400utc_goes18_microphysicsRGB_Starship.png\" width=\"3002\" height=\"1874\" \/><\/a><p class=\"wp-caption-text\">10-minute GOES-18 Microphysics RGB images, from 0350-0430 UTC on 19 June [click to play MP4 animation]<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>5-minute CONUS Sector GOES-19 (GOES-East) Near-Infrared and Shortwave Infrared images (above) showed thermal signatures of an explosion of SpaceX Starship at the Starbase launch facility in South Texas that occurred at 0401 UTC on 19 June or 11:01 PM CDT on 18 June 2025 (NASASpaceflight.com article). The resulting large fire was hot enough to be [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":18,"featured_media":65411,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,114,159,158,106],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-65386","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-fire-detection","category-goes-18","category-goes-19","category-ngfs","category-rocket-signatures"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65386","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/18"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=65386"}],"version-history":[{"count":31,"href":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65386\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":65495,"href":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65386\/revisions\/65495"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/65411"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=65386"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=65386"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cimss.ssec.wisc.edu\/satellite-blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=65386"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}