Late last night, the Falcon 9 rocket that launched 21 Starlink satellites into low Earth orbit (LEO) from the Cape Canaveral Space Station in Florida overturned on the unmanned spacecraft after landing due to a fire in the tail or rear of the rocket. The last abnormal landing of SpaceX's Falcon 9 booster occurred in August this year, and this time, the rocket capsized after a successful landing.

The most recent launch of the Falcon 9 rocket by the Space Exploration Technology Company (SpaceX) sent a batch of Starlink satellites into space. 13 of the 21 spacecrafts have typical direct-connect cellular hardware configurations. The booster used for this mission is relatively "new" by SpaceX standards, as this is the rocket's fifth mission. Three of the booster's flights, including yesterday's launch, were for Starlink, and the remainder were for a NASA mission and the Maxar satellite.

The live broadcast of SpaceX's Starlink launch showed that the Falcon 9 successfully landed on the unmanned spacecraft, and then the screen switched to the second-stage booster flying into space. The duration of streams during Starlink launches are typically shorter, and unlike the earliest missions, SpaceX simply broadcast the launch without any commentary from the host.

However, SpaceX revealed in a briefing released about 12 hours after launch that its first-stage booster capsized after landing. A similar accident occurred before in August, when the Falcon 9 flipped almost immediately after landing. The crash was captured on a SpaceX live broadcast and the rocket was grounded while SpaceX worked with the FAA to resolve the unusual situation.

This time, SpaceX revealed that a fire broke out in the tail or bottom of the rocket shortly after landing. The fire damaged one of the rocket's landing legs, causing it to capsize. Previous Falcon 9 landing videos showed that after the rocket landed, the fire-extinguishing system was activated immediately to extinguish the fire caused by residual propellant in the rocket system.

It is still unclear whether the fire that caused the rocket to capsize was due to an abnormality in the aircraft or the fire-extinguishing system. SpaceX did confirm that the fire was "abnormal," so by all accounts the fault appeared to be with the rocket. The next Falcon 9 mission will lift off from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California to launch a NASA Earth observatory.