SpaceX's April rocket test accident has been confirmed by Elon Musk

A pipe in a rocket booster prototype flattened as a result of an accident during a test earlier this month, SpaceX chief Elon Musk confirmed. 

After another accident resulting in a huge fireball at the rocket's base earlier this month, SpaceX rolled back its booster prototype from the launch pad to its development facilities. This is SpaceX's next-generation launch system.

SpaceX's Raptor 2 rocket engine design and other key nuggets of information about the rocket engine were explained in an interview uploaded on YouTube.

Starship's Booster 7 prototype was subjected to a pressurization test. SpaceX conducted this test in April, just before another accident earlier this month, and shortly afterward, unverified images began circulating on social media claiming that the test flattened the downcomer pipe of Booster 7. 

Due to the tank's location on top of the liquid Oxygen tank, the downcomer must travel through the latter to transport the fuel from its Methane tank to the rocket engines.

To maintain the structural integrity of rocket tanks, the downcomers themselves must also be capable of withstanding such high pressures to preserve the structural integrity. 

The rocket part was damaged in the April test, so this was not the case. The booster was nevertheless transported back from the launch pad to SpaceX's testing facilities despite not being officially confirmed at the time.

The 230-foot rocket was transported back to SpaceX's facilities, repaired, and shipped back in just two weeks due to its culture of moving fast. Mr. Musk confirmed the accident in an interview given on YouTube by Everyday Astronaut. He explained that his plane had been hit by a meteorite.

An employee of SpaceX chimed in to say how much they appreciate accidents such as these that allow them to learn from them.

SpaceX's designs are experimented with rapidly, tested, failed, and then tweaked in response to failure, unlike traditional aerospace firms and government agencies that design their equipment to exacting standards.

With this approach, the company is the only one on earth that launches and lands medium-lift rockets to and from orbit, enabling the company to become the leading space agency in the world.

The rocket engine igniter design for Musk's company's latest rocket engine was also discussed during the interview. An igniter ignites premixed fuel and oxidizer in any engine, including SpaceX's Raptor 2.

Several technical details of the new ignitions - including their location inside the engine - are proprietary SpaceX designs, preventing the executive from providing any information that might endanger U.S. security.

In addition to reducing complexity, failure modes, engine weight, and costs and improving ignition reliability, Musk said that the Raptor 2's ignition is a SpaceX 'secret sauce.'