Video has surfaced of the Falcon 9 rocket explosion that happened this morning at SpaceX's launch facility in Cape Canaveral. US Launch Report, a nonprofit video production company that brings military veterans to see space launches, published the video to its YouTube channel this afternoon.
Not long before the video was published, SpaceX CEO Elon Musk said on Twitter that the explosion originated around the oxygen tank of the rocket's upper stage. The cause is still unknown.
SpaceX was fueling up the Falcon 9 rocket for a test before this weekend's scheduled launch of the Amos-6 satellite. Amos-6 was lost in the accident — you can see the fairing, or the top of the rocket where the satellite was being housed, fall to the ground shortly after the initial explosion. Facebook had planned to use Amos-6 to deliver wireless connectivity to sub-Saharan Africa as part of its Internet.org program. In a statement released shortly after the explosion, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg said he was "deeply disappointed to hear that SpaceX's launch failure destroyed our satellite."
