Nassau, The Bahamas (CMC) – The Bahamas government announced on Friday that officials from SpaceX are due in the country following Thursday night’s explosion of a SpaceX Starship rocket, with debris falling into Bahamian airspace.
“The debris from Starship fell into our airspace in the Southern Bahamas. Following the incident, SpaceX [employed] contingency measures, which include immediate and continual communication with Bahamian officials,” the government said in a statement.
The government said it has since been assured by SpaceX that the debris contains no toxic materials and that the debris is not expected to have any significant impact on marine life or water quality.
“SpaceX teams will be in The Bahamas to conduct full debris recovery and cleanup efforts. We expect our applicable agencies, inclusive of the Department of Environmental Planning and Protection, will observe the clean-up activities,” the government said.
The SpaceX Starship spacecraft exploded on Thursday minutes after lifting off from Texas, dooming an attempt to deploy mock satellites in the second consecutive failure this year for Elon Musk’s Mars rocket programme.
Several videos on social media showed fiery debris streaking through the dusk skies near south Florida and the Bahamas after Starship’s breakup in space, which occurred shortly after it began to spin uncontrollably with its engines cut off.
“The Bahamas has no regulatory authority under The Bahamas’ Civil Aviation (Space Flight and Re-Entry) Regulations, 2025 over SpaceX’s Starship operations and this incident is not part of The Bahamas’ existing relationship with SpaceX’s Falcon 9 programme, which involves controlled booster landings in Bahamian waters following launches from Kennedy Space in Florida. The FAA issues the launch license for Starship exercises,” the statement added.
The incident resulted in several flight delays on Thursday, and the government statement said that “The Bahamas was required under an existing treaty to issue a Notice to Mariners (NOTMAR) for maritime safety coordination.”
