The New Shepard rocket and capsule system developed by US billionaire Jeff Bezos has had to abort a mission mid-flight over the Texas desert.
The rocket experienced what appeared to be a propulsion failure about one minute after leaving the launch pad.
A motor pushed the capsule clear, enabling it to make a soft return to the ground with the aid of parachutes.
New Shepard regularly carries people, but on this occasion, the only payload was a batch of zero-G experiments.
The incident occurred at an altitude of just over 28,000ft (8.5km) while the vehicles were moving upwards at 700mph (1,120km/h).
The system is designed to sense problems in the booster rocket and then push the capsule away to a safe distance.
“It appears that we’ve experienced an anomaly with today’s flight,” she said shortly after the separation of the capsule from the rocket booster.
“This wasn’t planned and we don’t have any details yet.”
This was the 23rd mission of New Shepard since its introduction in 2015.
In July 2021, on the system’s 16th outing, it started carrying people on short hops above the atmosphere. The crew on that occasion included Jeff Bezos himself and his brother, Mark.
Flight 18 gained international attention when it carried the Star Trek movie actor William Shatner aloft.