Elon musk's spacex 'starhopper' launch aborted as rocket catches fire
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The forced abortion took place during a test at Boca Chica Beach in Texas. Starhopper was intended to take off and hove 20m (66ft) above the ground. The rocket is a smaller-scale version of
the Starship rocket that Mr Musk wants to send to the Moon by 2021. Tech Crunch speculated the water jet may have caused the small fire to invite the vapour. The test was intended to test
the limits of Starhopper. SpaceX was founded in 2002 with the goal of reducing space transportation costs to eventually allow for colonisation of Mars. The company is estimated to have
around 7000 employees. Mr Musk, who founded SpaceX, is also its Lead Designer as well as CEO. The Tesla founder has degrees in both Economics and Physics. His net worth was recently
estimated to be $20.6billion (£16.5billion). Forbes reports the South African born businessman is the 40th richest person in the world.