For the first time ever, SpaceX has followed through on a Starship test launch by bringing back the Super Heavy booster for an on-target catch in the arms of its “Mechazilla” launch-tower cradle in Texas.
“This is a day for the engineering history books,” SpaceX launch commentator Kate Tice said.
Today’s successful catch marks a giant step toward using — and reusing — Starship for missions ranging from satellite deployments to NASA’s moon missions to migrations to Mars.
The amazing catch took place minutes after Super Heavy lofted Starship’s second stage, known as Ship, into space for the launch system’s fifth test flight. Liftoff occurred at 7:25 a.m. CT (1225 UTC) at SpaceX’s Starbase on the South Texas coast.
Although the primary objective of the test was to have Ship survive atmospheric re-entry and splash down intact in the Indian Ocean, the Super Heavy booster was the star of the show.
Super Heavy is not designed to set down on landing legs, as is the case for SpaceX’s workhorse Falcon 9 rocket. Instead, SpaceX went with a rocket-catching system at the pad, to maximize the booster’s payload capability and minimize the required turnaround time. Perfecting the Mechazilla catch is thus an essential part of SpaceX’s strategy for rapid rocket reusability.
The feat required pinpoint accuracy during the booster’s autonomous descent back through the atmosphere. It had to position itself precisely between Mechazilla’s adjustable arms, also known as “chopsticks,” and hover while the mechanism was engaged to secure the rocket.
If anything had gone wrong, Super Heavy would have been directed into the Gulf of Mexico rather than heading back to the launch pad after stage separation. Fortunately, everything went right.
“Even in this day and age, what we just saw, that looks like magic,” launch commentator Dan Huot said after the booster shut down its engines and came to rest, hanging on its launch tower.
Today’s test of Starship, which is the world’s most powerful rocket, proceeded according to plan from launch to splashdown. All 33 of the booster’s methane-fueled Raptor engines fired up for launch, and 13 of the Raptors powered the Super Heavy’s return to the pad.
The second stage continued at orbital speeds, on a suborbital test trajectory that rose to around 200 kilometers (124 miles). An hour after launch, Ship restarted three of its own Raptor engines and made an autonomous descent to its target splashdown point in the Indian Ocean.
During SpaceX’s fourth Starship test flight in June, the Ship sustained damage on the way down but survived for a splashdown. Ship’s thermal protection system was beefed up for today’s test.
Video views of the rocket’s flaps, sent down to Earth via SpaceX’s Starlink satellite network, showed heat building up on the control surfaces. Sparks flew off during the descent, but eventually the flaps cooled off — bringing rounds of applause from SpaceX employees who were watching the feed.
Minutes later, the rocket’s video stream showed Ship making a vertical dive into the water, and then a different stream from a nearby buoy showed Ship blazing as it bobbed on the surface.
“What an incredible end to Starship’s journey,” Tice said.
SpaceX founder Elon Musk hailed the results in a posting to his X social-media platform: “Ship landed precisely on target!” he wrote. “Second of the two objectives achieved.”
Data from the test flight will be used to fine-tune the launch system for future tests, using Starship hardware that has been stacked up at Starbase. Eventually, SpaceX aims to make the entire system fully reusable.
“We just caught a booster,” Huot said. “We’re going to start real soon looking at when we can catch a Ship.”
Starship could be used to accelerate the deployment of SpaceX’s Starlink satellites, and perhaps to provide point-to-point travel between terrestrial destinations as well.
NASA is depending on SpaceX to provide a modified version of Starship that would serve as the lander for crewed Artemis missions, beginning as soon as 2026. “As we prepare to go back to the moon under Artemis, continued testing will prepare us for the bold missions that lie ahead — including to the South Pole region of the moon and then on to Mars,” NASA Administrator Bill Nelson said in a congratulatory message posted to X.
SpaceX plans to use Starship for missions to Mars — starting with uncrewed trips that could get off the ground by as early as 2026, and continuing with crewed flights that could bring permanent residents to the Red Planet. Musk reportedly envisions building a city on Mars by the 2040s — and Starship is the key to his quest.
“Big step towards making life multiplanetary was made today,” Musk wrote on X.