Call it whatever you will. But this, is a fuck up. Yes yes yes, you will "learn" I am sure, but losing the rocket so early into the launch is ridiculous. The type of rating that will be determined by the government to send humans into space on this monster will not be "Well, your last flight didn't blow up, so we're probably OK on this one".
Starship will need to show a dozen flights of flawless operation before they entrust 100's of billions of dollars of equipment to go to Mars orbit, let alone humans. There isn't going to be a successful "fly to mars, land on the surface and then take off test" until the 2030's at this point.
The reality of Mars is still looking at 2040 or 2050 at this point unless something changes quickly - at least for the United States.
Ask yourself, what would the insurance premium be for a payload on Starship? At this rate, about 100% the value of the goods.
I didn't see The Saturn V rocket blow up - ever. Starship at this rate is more like the Russian N1 rocket. Starship should have had multiple successful launches at this point and made it into lunar orbit and back again, repeatedly - but don't you believe it, Elon is telling you that this thing is going to make it 45 million miles to Mars, land on the surface (without chopsticks) and take off again and come back home 45 million miles and land safely.
Pipe dreams, and Elon has been sucking on one for a decade. Congress didn't like NASAs projected cost for the Mars Mission and went shopping, and now we know why NASA gave them the figure they did.
