SpaceX's Starship megarocket roared into the skies Tuesday on its 10th test flight, following a string of explosive failures that cast doubt about its ability to realize Elon Musk's vision of colonizing Mars.

Standing 403 feet (123 meters) tall, the most powerful launch vehicle ever built lifted off from the company's Starbase in southern Texas at 6:30pm local time (2330 GMT), triggering loud cheers from engineering teams, a webcast showed.

Starship is key to Musk's ambitions of making humanity a multiplanetary species, while NASA is awaiting a modified version to act as a lander for its plans to return astronauts to the Moon.

A launch attempt on Sunday was scrubbed due to a fuel leak on the launchpad, and on Monday weather intervened as thick clouds forced another delay.

Much is ridin

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