A Boston man was stuck on the tarmac for around an hour after a SpaceX rocket broke apart on Thursday, raining debris into the air and shutting down airports in Florida.

“We were getting ready to board, take off, and the next thing we know it’s 6:50 pm, 6:55 pm, 7:00 pm. Next thing we know, we are still sitting on the runway,” says Hisham Fayed, a Bostonian stuck on a tarmac in Miami. 

“The pilot comes on and says there is something going on at the airport where all flights had been halted for an hour due to a lost rocket launch.”

SpaceX rocket breaks apart

SpaceX launched its giant, unmanned Starship rocket for its eighth test flight, and for the second time, it failed. The vehicle is critical to NASA being able to return astronauts from the moon. 

While the upper part of the rocket barreled toward space, the first stage returned to Earth and was successfully caught by mechanical arms known as “chopsticks.” After 8 minutes in the air, four engines on the upper stage shut down, and it began to spin and lose contact.

“Everyone searched it on social, and you see everyone’s phones going off. You hear the audio from the other videos,” says Fayed.

He says the videos showed debris falling down near the airport.

“Seeing fire trucks and first responders all over the runway, I am like, are we in the debris area? Thankfully, we weren’t,” says Fayed.

After an hour of waiting, their plane was able to take off. Fayed says he is glad for the extra precaution.