The thunderous power of SpaceX's first unmanned test flight of Starship – the most giant and most powerful rocket ever built – has inflicted severe damage on its Texas launch site, which is expected to take months to repair, potentially delaying further launch attempts and slowing the development of a rocket NASA plans to use on its upcoming moon missions.

Before the test, SpaceX boss Elon Musk said that getting Starship in the air without destroying its launch pad would be "a win." Luckily for Musk, the 120-meter (390-foot) tall rocket successfully lifted off, climbing for about four minutes until it tumbled and exploded well over the Gulf of Mexico.

However, SpaceX engineers may have underestimated the damage that Starship's 33 first-stage rocket engines would do. A few days later, the scene around the launch pad is desolate.

During takeoff, SpaceX video showed a hail of debris being blasted as far as the Gulf of Mexico, over 420 meters away. According to local press reports, a cloud of dust floated over a small town several kilometers away.

Photos of the launch site show the gigantic launch tower still standing while the rocket mount, which supports Starship before liftoff, is damaged but still intact. Beneath it, however, lies a vast crater, images posted on social media showed.

"The force of the engines when they throttled up may have shattered the concrete, rather than simply eroding it," Musk conceded Saturday on Twitter – another company in his portfolio.

Delay of months

Olivier de Weck, a professor of astronautics and engineering at MIT, told Agence France-Presse (AFP) that "the radius of debris and disturbance was probably bigger than anybody anticipated."

"The main damage to the launch pad is underneath, where the flames impinge on the ground," he told AFP, adding that repairing the crater "will take several months."

De Weck said that Starship's launch site, unlike others used for large rockets, lacked a "water deluge system." Those are used to flood the pad with water, cool it, and absorb shock and sound waves.

The Texas site also lacks what is known as a flame trench – tunnels that channel hot exhaust away from the pad. Such features come at a high price, though, particularly when they have to stand up to the earth-shaking power of Starship.

After Thursday's test, Musk said that SpaceX had begun building "a massive water-cooled steel plate to go under the launch mount." But it "wasn't ready in time," and engineers "wrongly" calculated that the pad could still withstand the test.

Known for audacious goal-setting, Musk estimates that a next launch attempt could be carried out as soon as "one to two months."

Melting steel

Scientist Philip Metzger, who previously worked on launch pad physics for NASA, said he thought the steel plate plan could have been "a good solution."

"The problem," he added, "is that this is such a large rocket and it takes so long to get off the pad," that the heat from the rocket's 33 engines "possibly could melt the steel."

That could be solved by pumping water through channels in the steel "so long as they have a high enough flow rate," said Metzger, now a University of Central Florida professor.

He said the approach would not entirely solve the problem of shock waves, but he believes Starship may have been designed to be solid enough to survive.

Designing a launch pad, Metzger told AFP, can be just as complicated as developing a rocket.

The maiden launch in November of NASA's new mega-rocket, the SLS, also caused damage to its launch pad in Florida, notably knocking launch-tower elevators out of service.

Before its next test flight, SpaceX must determine the exact problems behind Thursday's test.

In a video broadcast by the company, several of Starship's 33 engines appeared to malfunction.

The rocket's two stages did not separate as planned, forcing SpaceX to trigger a self-destruct mechanism.

The private aerospace firm must also persuade the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to authorize a new flight, noted de Weck.

The U.S. agency leading an investigation into the explosion has confirmed that no injuries resulted from Thursday's test. However, it has said that no new tests will be approved if there is any threat to public safety.

De Weck echoed Musk's trial evaluation, calling it "more a success than a failure."

"They're achieving these incredible capabilities," the MIT professor continued, "because they are willing to take risks and break things.

"But they learn from it and improve very, very quickly."