An unmanned cargo¹ ship destined² for the International Space Station blew up minutes after launching from the Cape³ Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida on Sunday morning, NASA said, raising questions about how the agency and its partners will continue keeping the station supplied.

美国国家航空航天局(NASA)表示，周日上午，在从佛罗里达州的卡纳维拉尔角空军基地发射数分钟后，一艘前往国际空间站的无人驾驶货运飞船发生了爆炸。这对该机构及其合作伙伴将如何为空间站提供补给提出了疑问。

The countdown had proceeded without a hitch⁴ or worries about weather, and the 208-foot-tall rocket lifted off at 10:21 a.m. Eastern time. But 2 minutes, 19 seconds later, just as George Diller, the commentator⁵ of NASA's television broadcast, said, “Data coming back shows vehicle on course, on track,” a cloud of white smoke emerged from the rocket's midsection, and then a rain of pieces started falling toward the Atlantic Ocean more than 20 miles below.

倒计时进行得很顺利，天气方面也没有任何问题，208英尺（约合63.4米）高的火箭在美国东部时间上午10时21分升空。但是2分钟19秒后，正当NASA的电视直播评论员乔治·迪勒(George Diller)表示“传送回来的数据显示，飞船按计划在轨道上飞行”时，一团白色烟雾从火箭的中段冒出，然后雨点一般的碎片开始向20多英里之下的大西洋坠落。

Elon Musk⁶, the chief executive of SpaceX, reported on Twitter, “Falcon⁷ 9 experienced a problem shortly before first stage shutdown.” About an hour later, he added some preliminary analysis: “There was an overpressure event in the upper stage liquid oxygen tank. Data suggests counterintuitive cause.”

SpaceX公司的首席执行官埃隆·马斯克(Elon Musk)在Twitter上表示：“‘猎鹰9号’在第一级燃料耗尽之前不久遇到了问题。”大约一个小时后，他又做了一些初步的分析：“火箭上一级的液氧罐有超压现象。数据表明，出现了有悖常理的原因。

The more than 4,000 pounds of payload included a docking adapter needed for future crew capsules being developed by Boeing and SpaceX, student experiments and a camera to record meteors streaking⁸ into the earth's atmosphere.

这艘飞船4000多磅的有效载荷中包括波音(Boeing)和SpaceX共同研发的供未来的船员舱使用的一个对接接合器、一些学生实验用具，以及准备记录流星进入地球大气层状况的一台摄像机。

It was first failure in 19 launchings of the Falcon 9 rocket built by Space Exploration Technologies of Hawthorne, California, better known as SpaceX.

这是位于加利福尼亚州霍桑的太空探索技术公司(Space Exploration Technologies Corporation)——更多地被简称为SpaceX——制造的“猎鹰9号”火箭19次发射历史上的首次失败。

Until now, SpaceX has had a charmed record with the Falcon 9, avoiding the “infant mortality” that usually afflicts⁹ new rocket designs.

迄今为止，SpaceX的“猎鹰9号”火箭保持了骄人的记录，避免了通常会困扰新火箭设计的“早期故障期”。

This episode follows the failures of two other cargo rockets. In October, an Antares rocket, built by Orbital ATK, exploded on the launching pad in Virginia. In April, a Russian Progress rocket spun¹⁰ out of control, unable to reach the space station.

在此次事故发生之前，还有另外两枚运载火箭发射失败。去年10月，Orbital ATK制造的安塔尔(Antares)火箭在弗吉尼亚州的发射台上爆炸。今年4月，俄罗斯“进步号”(Progress)火箭失去控制，无法到达空间站。

The three astronauts on the space station — Scott J. Kelly of NASA and two Russians, Gennady Padalka and Mikhail Kornienko — are not in any immediate¹¹ danger, with sufficient supplies to last until October, Michael T. Suffredini, NASA's space station program manager, said during a news conference on Friday.

NASA空间站项目的负责人迈克尔·T·苏弗雷迪尼(Michael T. Suffredini)在周五的新闻发布会上表示，空间站的三名宇航员——NASA的斯科特·J·凯利(Scott J. Kelly)及两名俄罗斯人根纳季·帕达尔卡(Gennady Padalka)和米哈伊尔·科尔尼延科(Mikhail Kornienko)——暂时没有危险，他们的供给足以支撑到10月。