Starship booster caught by SpaceX
SpaceX successfully “caught” the first stage booster of its Starship megarocket on Sunday as it returned to the launch pad after a test flight, a world first in the company’s quest for rapid re-usability.
The “super heavy booster” had blasted off attached to the Starship rocket minutes earlier, then made a picture-perfect controlled return to the same pad in Texas, where a pair of huge mechanical “chopsticks” reached out from the launch tower to bring the slowly descending booster to a halt, according to a live stream from Elon Musk’s SpaceX company.
While the booster returned to the launchpad, the upper stage of Starship was due to splash down in the Indian Ocean within the hour.
During its last flight in June, SpaceX achieved its first successful splashdown with Starship, a prototype spaceship that Musk hopes will one day carry humans to Mars.
Nasa is also awaiting a modified version of Starship to act as a lander vehicle for crewed flights to the moon under the Artemis programme later this decade.
Starship is 121m tall with both stages combined. Its super heavy booster, which is 71m tall, produces 16.7 million pounds of thrust, about twice as powerful as the Saturn V rockets used during the Apollo missions.
SpaceX’s strategy of rapid iterative testing, even when its rockets blow up, has accelerated development and contributed to the company’s success.
Mechazilla has caught the Super Heavy booster! pic.twitter.com/6R5YatSVJX
— SpaceX (@SpaceX) October 13, 2024
It is now the world leader in orbital launches, besides providing the only US spaceship certified to carry astronauts. It has also created the world’s biggest internet satellite constellation – invaluable in disaster and war zones.
Cape Times