WASHINGTON — Elon Musk's SpaceX launched its giant Starship rocket to space from Texas on Tuesday, advancing the ship's spaceflight abilities but botching an attempt to bring its booster back to land as US President-elect Donald Trump watched from the company's rocket facilities.

The roughly 122-meter-tall rocket system, designed to land astronauts on the moon and ferry crews to Mars, lifted off at 4 pm from SpaceX's rocket development site in Boca Chica, Texas.

The rocket's 71-meter-tall first stage booster, called Super Heavy, detached from its second stage, Starship, at roughly 62 kilometers in altitude, sending the craft into space.

Super Heavy unexpectedly splashed down in the Gulf of Mexico instead of returning to land, where it was expected to fall into large mechanical arms attached to the tower from which it launched. The last-minute diversion to water indicated something went wrong.

Starship last month demonstrated the novel catch-landing method for the first time, achieving a key milestone in its reusable design. Tuesday's catch-landing was supposed to be "faster/harder", Musk had written on social media before the launch.

In space, Starship traveled around Earth for a daytime splashdown in the Indian Ocean roughly an hour later.

Trump's attendance signals a deepening alliance with Musk, who stands to benefit from Trump's election victory. The billionaire entrepreneur was a prominent supporter of Trump's election campaign, appearing with him at rallies and backing him with at least $119 million in political support.

Agencies Via Xinhua