SpaceX Catches Part of Its Starship Rocket on Return to Earth

Billionaire Elon Musk's SpaceX has achieved another major milestone in its Starship programme, successfully catching the spacecraft's upper stage at its Texas launch tower after a 22-hour test flight around Earth. 

SpaceX’s megarocket Starship returned to its Texas launch tower on Saturday, a milestone in the company’s efforts to make the craft suitable for human spaceflight.

The 171ft (52-meter) bullet-shaped upper stage descended into the clutch of the tower’s mechanical arms, ending a 22hr mission where the craft orbited Earth 14 times.

Starship’s 15th test flight was envisioned as a historic double-catch mission, where all parts of the rocket would be returned intact to the launch site, rather than recovered from the ocean as with some previous test flights.

The hulking spacecraft is composed of two parts: a lower booster stage called Super Heavy, whose Raptor engines powered the orbital ascent, and an upper stage also called Starship.

Those double-catch ambitions were dashed on Friday, when the booster diverted a few minutes after takeoff and exploded in the Gulf of Mexico.

This is the 15th test of Starship and the first that hoped to fully recover both parts of the rocket. SpaceX wants to make the top and bottom sections of Starship fully reusable.

The 124m-tall (407ft) rocket successfully blasted off from the Starbase launchpad in Boca Chica, Texas at 16:47 local time on Friday.

The plan was to grab the bottom part of the rocket - the Super Heavy booster - six and a half minutes later when it returned.

But the booster activated an automated abort, diverting instead to the ocean where it hovered above the water before exploding.

Elon Musk later posted on X that the booster was "slightly low on fuel"

The top part of the rocket continued its journey to space where it deployed 26 satellites, which form part of the Starlink constellation that provides high-speed internet.

The Ship completed 14 orbits around the Earth before returning to the launch tower.

SpaceX has managed to catch the Super Heavy Booster on three earlier test flights.

But this was the first time the upper stage of the rocket, which only reached orbit for the first time in September, has been grabbed by the "chopsticks".

There were loud cheers from SpaceX staff who were watching the flight as the rocket returned to the Starbase launchpad in Boca Chica, Texas.

Soon afterwards, SpaceX founder and CEO Elon Musk congratulated his “incredible team”.

SpaceX officials said Saturday’s catch demonstrates Starship’s full reusability, crucial for rapid, low-cost recycling.

SOURCE: THE GUARDIAN | BBC | AL JAZEERA