SpaceX has grounded its massive yet daring test flight Starship rocket On Sunday, he held the booster back onto the launch pad with mechanical arms.
A delighted Elon Musk called it “science fiction without the fiction part.”
Almost 400 feet (121 meters) high, the empty starship blasted off at sunrise from the southern tip of Texas near the Mexican border. Like four starships before it, it swept over the Gulf of Mexico DestroyedImmediately after take-off or landing at sea. The previous one in June was very successful until Sunday’s demo, Completes its flight without exploding.
Meanwhile, Musk, the CEO and founder of SpaceX, raised the challenge for the rocket he plans to use to send people to the moon and Mars.
On the command of the flight director, the first stage booster flew back to the launch pad where it had exploded seven minutes earlier. The missile turret’s monstrous metal arms, dubbed chopsticks, grasped the descending 232-foot (71-meter) stainless steel booster, holding it tight and dangling well off the ground.
“The tower caught the rocket!!” Musk announced via X. “A big step toward universalizing life was made today.”
Company employees screamed and jumped for joy, pumping their fists in the air. NASA Administrator Bill Nelson joined the celebration as he sent his congratulations.
Nelson noted that continued Starship testing will prepare the nation to land astronauts on the moon’s south pole. NASA’s new Artemis program is a follow-up to Apollo, which put 12 men on the moon half a century ago.
“Guys, this is a day for the engineering history books,” said SpaceX Engineering Manager Kate Tice from SpaceX headquarters in Hawthorne, California.
“Even in this day and age, what we just saw is magical,” company spokesman Dan Hood said from near the launch and landing site. “I’m shaking now.”
The pilot must decide in real-time with manual control whether to attempt a landing. SpaceX said both the booster and the launch tower should be in good, stable condition. Otherwise, you can go to the Gulf as before. Everything was judged to be up for grabs.
Once freed from the booster, the above blank retro-looking spacecraft continued around the world. An hour later, it made a controlled landing in the Indian Ocean, adding to the record for the day. Cameras on a nearby buoy filmed flames rising from the water as the target hit and sank precisely as planned.
“What a day,” Hood said. “Let’s get ready for the next one.”
The June plane eventually came up short after pieces arrived. SpaceX updated the software and reworked the heat shield and improved the heat sink.
After delivering satellites and crews to orbit from Florida or California, SpaceX has been recovering the first-stage boosters of its smaller Falcon 9 rockets for nine years. But they land on floating sea platforms or on concrete slabs miles from their launch pads — none of them.
Recycling the Falcon boosters sped up the launch rate and saved SpaceX millions. Musk wants to do the same for the largest and most powerful rocket Starship, built with 33 methane-fueled engines in the booster alone.
Musk said the captured starship booster was in good shape from all the heat and aerodynamic forces, with some external engines slightly damaged. That can be easily fixed, he said.
NASA has ordered two Starships to land astronauts on the Moon later this decade. SpaceX intends to use Starship to send people and supplies to the Moon and eventually to Mars.
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