FAA grounds SpaceX Falcon 9 rockets pending investigation of rare offshore crash-landing

The Federal Aviation Administration has grounded SpaceX's Falcon 9 rockets pending an investigation to determine what caused a first-stage booster to crash onto a landing barge early Wednesday after helping launch another batch of Starlink internet satellites.

After standing down from the piloted Polaris Dawn launch late Tuesday because of an unfavorable long-range forecast, SpaceX pressed ahead with the first of two planned back-to-back launches of Starlinks, one from Florida and the other from California.

But the second flight was called off after the first stage used in the Florida launch crash-landed and toppled into the Atlantic Ocean while attempting to touch down on a SpaceX droneship stationed several hundred miles northeast of Cape Canaveral.