SpaceX launches most powerful rocket ever built on third test flight from...

SpaceX's mega-rocket blasted off on another test flight Thursday, aiming to make it halfway around the world this time. The first two flights last year lasted mere minutes before blowing up over the Gulf of Mexico.

Starship, the biggest and most powerful rocket ever built, soared from the southern tip of Texas near the Mexican border and headed out over the gulf. No people or satellites were on board. The rocket and futuristic-looking spacecraft towers 397 feet (121 meters), easily exceeding NASA's past and present moon rockets.

SpaceX's Elon Musk was shooting for a shorter, hourlong flight on the latest demo, with the Indian Ocean as the spacecraft's finish line. He noted that the company made thousands of upgrades and fixes to improve the odds.

Read: Mission Divyastra: Meet Sheena Rani, brain behind India's Agni-5 missile with multiple warheads

NASA watched with keen interest: The space agency needs Starship to succeed in landing astronauts on the moon in the next two or so years. This new crop of moonwalkers — the first since last century's Apollo program — will descend to the lunar surface in a Starship, at least the first couple of times.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by DNA staff and is published from PTI/AP.)