The SpaceX Starship rocket's Super Heavy booster lands as seen from South Padre Island near Brownsville, Texas, U.S., Jan. 16. Reuters-Yonhap

The upper stage of SpaceX's Starship rocket exploded minutes after launch from Texas on Thursday, leading the aerospace company to declare the vessel a "loss" in the seventh test flight of the heavy-lift spacecraft. The mission was uncrewed.

"Success is uncertain, but entertainment is guaranteed!" SpaceX CEO Elon Musk posted on X about the incident.

The rocket launched at 4:37 p.m. CT from SpaceX's South Texas facilities.

After about 8 1/2 minutes into the flight and following stage separation, the upper stage of the rocket appeared to explode.

Videos posted to social media show the upper stage of the craft exploding over the Caribbean near the Turks and Caicos, sending flaming streams of brightly colored debris toward Earth, shining against the dusky sky. The fireballs likely were pieces of debris burning as they re-entered Earth's atmosphere, officials said.

"We can confirm that we did lose the ship," senior manager of quality systems engineering Kate Tice said on the SpaceX live feed about 24 minutes after the launch. SpaceX said it lost contact with the ship at 8 minutes, 24 seconds into the flight.

Orange balls of light fly across the sky as debris from a SpaceX rocket launched in Texas is spotted over Turks and Caicos Islands, Jan. 16, in this screen grab obtained from social media video. Reuters-Yonhap

A similar incident occurred on the second test launch of the Starship last year.

In a statement later Thursday, SpaceX said initial data indicates a fire occurred in the rocket, "leading to a rapid unscheduled disassembly."

SpaceX added that any surviving pieces of debris would have fallen within a pre-launch designated hazard area.

"As always, success comes from what we learn, and this flight test will help us improve Starship's reliability as SpaceX seeks to make life multiplanetary," it said.

The Starship was carrying a batch of satellite simulators designed to mimic the next generation of Starlink satellites, which are expected to be bigger and heavier. This was the seventh of 10 planned Starship test flights.

SpaceX, however, was successful Thursday in catching Starship's returning fuel booster stage at 6 minutes, 56 seconds after launch. It did so with a pair of mechanical arms on the launch tower that the company refers to as "chopsticks."

Bill Nelson, NASA administrator, congratulated SpaceX for the completion of its seventh test flight and second successful booster catch.

"Spaceflight is not easy," he said on X, which is also owned by Musk. "It's anything but routine. That's why these tests are so important — each one bringing us closer on our path to the moon and onward to Mars through Artemis," he said, referring to a NASA project.

The company launched the Starship on Thursday from SpaceX's Starbase in Boca Chica, Texas.

The Federal Aviation Administration, which regulates commercial spaceflight, said in a statement that it had "briefly slowed and diverted aircraft around the area where space vehicle debris was falling," The New York Times reported. (UPI)