A commercial supply ship bound for the International Space Station exploded moments after liftoff Tuesday. The unmanned rocket was carrying 5,000 pounds of cargo for NASA.
Experiments by some students in Houston have been destroyed in the explosion of a $200 million commercial supply rocket after liftoff. The students made the trip to the Virginia site to watch the launch.
Sixteen students from Cristo Rey Jesuit College Preparatory School spent a year working on experiments, including senior Peter Obi.
"We got there," said Obi. "We were all excited because we were about to see something that we built go into space. But then we saw the smoke, and security started telling us to evacuate. Then we thought about it and realized that everything we designed had just been destroyed."
One experiment was to study the effect of microgravity on slime mold, and the other involved lipids.
"To say that sometimes science learns the most from its failures is kind of inadequate," said science teacher Greg Adragna. "They've invested over a year of their time into this. These students selected, designed, built these experiments — countless hours, a lot of dedication."
One student says space is unpredictable and you never know what's going to happen.
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