A Chinese rocket narrowly missed a landing on Sunday—the video is amazing

Enlarge / The Nebula-1 rocket just before attempting to land on Sunday. (credit: Deep Blue Aerospace)

A Chinese space startup conducted what it called a “high-altitude” test flight of its Nebula-1 rocket on Sunday, launching the vehicle to an altitude of about 5 km or so before attempting to land it back at the Ejin Banner Spaceport in Inner Mongolia.

The test flight went well for about two and a half minutes before the vehicle experienced a problem just before landing and erupted into a fireball.

This is not the first vertical rocket landing test by a Chinese company, but what sets Deep Blue Aerospace apart from its competitors is its transparency. Within hours the company released a detailed statement about the test flight, its objectives, and a preliminary review of what went wrong.