Dozens of commercial airplanes were forced to change course to avoid falling debris after a SpaceX rocket exploded over the Gulf of Mexico, Reuters reported. The massive Starship rocket broke up in space just minutes after launching from Texas on Thursday,

SpaceX, the private space technology company owned by Elon Musk, is asking federal authorities to approve a new round of tests for a prototype reusable rocket, but some of them may never make it back to the surface intact and will crash in the ocean.

Flights across the Caribbean were hastily diverted on Thursday following the explosion of a rocket built by Elon Musk's company, SpaceX. The chaos was revealed in flight tracking data and audio exchanges between pilots and air traffic control, as reviewed by NPR.