From BBC

A rocket operated by the aerospace company SpaceX has exploded on the launch pad at Cape Canaveral where it was being test-fired ahead of a launch.

The force of the blast shook buildings several miles away and sent a plume of smoke high above the complex.

In a statement, the company blamed the blast on “an anomaly” and said no-one had been injured.

It said the rocket’s payload, a communications satellite due to launch on Saturday, was also destroyed.

Facebook, in partnership with Eutelsat Communications, had been due to use the Israeli-built Amos-6 satellite to deliver broadband internet coverage for swathes of sub-Saharan Africa as part of its Internet.org initiative.

Experts said the satellite was valued at more than $200m (£150m).

Cape Canaveral Air Force Station said a “significant” explosion happened just after 09:00 (14:00 GMT) at Launch Complex 40, which is leased by SpaceX.

“Our emergency management teams are responding right now,” said spokesman Bryan Purtell.

SpaceX is aiming to create a new era of reusable rockets and affordable private space travel and has used its Falcon-9 rocket to take supplies to the International Space Station (ISS).

In December last year, the California-based company successfully landed a Falcon-9 back on Earth after a mission to launch orbiting satellites – a first in rocketry.

It went on to recover five more boosters, with most of them returning to an ocean platform.

The idea is to re-fly these rockets, and the first such “second hand” vehicle is scheduled to launch in October.

SpaceX is run out of Hawthorne near Los Angeles by Elon Musk, who made his fortune with internet companies.

As well as being the rocket company’s CEO, he also heads up the Tesla electric car company.

Analysis: David Shukman, Science Editor, BBC News

Whatever the details of what went wrong at the launch-pad, this is bad news for one of the most ambitious-ever space programmes.

SpaceX has big dreams for cheap, frequent and distant space travel. This test-firing was meant to be routine, part of an accelerating series of launches.

Beyond it, SpaceX is looking to make history by re-using one of the massive first stages that was returned to Earth intact. The company is also preparing to fly astronauts to the International Space Station.

Most exotic of all, the company’s boss, Elon Musk, is due later this month to unveil his plans for a Mars colony, and how that would take effect.

There had been talk of the first SpaceX unmanned mission to the Red Planet in a couple of years’ time. All its timetables will now be in jeopardy.

IMAGES:

The Falcon-9 booster is designed to return to Earth, touching down on land or a floating platform

An employee at the Kennedy Space Center took this image of the blast

For more on this story and video go to: http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-37247077