In Japan, a space rocket caught fire during tests. Here are the details (video included).

On the morning of Tuesday, November 26, a failure occurred in the engine of the second stage of the Epsilon S rocket 49 seconds after the ground tests began at the Tanegashima Space Center in the southeastern Kagoshima Prefecture, as reported by Bloomberg.

It was noted that a live broadcast from Japan's national broadcaster showed plumes of smoke rising from the incident site. There were no injuries, and the cause of the fire has not yet been determined, the agency reported.

The incident led to a drop in the stock prices of rocket manufacturers. Shares of IHI Corp., which developed the rocket in collaboration with the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), fell by 7% at the start of trading.

The first launch of the Epsilon rocket is scheduled for March next year, but this unsuccessful test — the second after a similar incident last year — could result in further delays in the program.

The three-stage solid-fuel Epsilon rocket, designed in 2007 for launching scientific spacecraft, has a total length of 26 meters and can carry payloads of up to 1500 kg into orbit. The cost of a launch is approximately $38 million.

As a reminder, scientists from Kyoto University, together with engineers from the forestry company Sumitomo Forestry, created a cube-shaped research satellite. The wooden device, LignoSat, was made from magnolia wood.