It's been wild to see people here try and spin this as a success story, because the rocket launch was missing things known to be required and the end result was as you mentioned. Massive destruction of the surrounding area which is going to require months of rebuilding and tons of $$$.
Because they achieved what they were trying to do? They said if it got 50 seconds into flight it was a success and it did. No Spin, they literally mentioned this objective before the flight, it's more wild for people to suggest that it wasn't despite it exceeding it's objectives.
I listened to Musk give a QA about this last week before the initial launch date. He very clearly defined success as reaching orbit, and stated that success wasn’t likely.
Pouring more concrete is not very expensive. It takes a month to cure completely, but the next test is multiple months out regardless. By that time they'll have the deluge equipment installed.
