SpaceX’s Starship spacecraft has returned to Earth after a 22-hour journey, where it was caught midair by giant mechanical arms at the same launch site from which it had taken off.
The spacecraft emerged from a cloudy sky on Saturday and slowly descended over Starbase in Texas before passing smoothly between two giant mechanical arms, known as “chopsticks”, above Launch Pad 2. It was the first time a Starship returning from space had been caught in this way, reports Al Jazeera.
Soon after the successful catch, SpaceX founder and CEO Elon Musk congratulated his “incredible team”.
SpaceX officials said the achievement demonstrated Starship’s full reusability, a key requirement for making launches faster and reducing costs.
However, the company failed to achieve its planned double recovery after the first-stage booster exploded shortly after Friday’s liftoff from Texas.
The upper-stage spacecraft separated successfully from the booster and continued its journey into orbit, where it released 26 advanced Starlink satellites.
SpaceX official Kate Tice said the spacecraft’s engines shut down too early during its return journey. The booster’s guidance system detected that it was not in the correct position and automatically triggered a diversion into the water, followed by its destruction. Engineers are still investigating what caused the failure.
Despite Friday’s failed booster recovery, SpaceX had successfully caught three boosters in previous attempts, demonstrating that the recovery technique works.
NASA, which is spending billions of dollars on Starship to carry Artemis astronauts to the Moon later this decade, welcomed Saturday’s achievement.
“It was almost magic,” NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman said in a post on X.
During the mission, Starship completed 14 orbits around the Earth at an altitude of 265km (165 miles), a significant improvement over its previous mission, when it completed only one or two orbits.
SpaceX said all systems aboard the spacecraft, including its critical heat shield, appeared to have performed well.
This was the 15th flight of a full-scale Starship since 2023 and only its second journey into orbit.
Standing 124 metres (407 feet) tall, Starship is the world’s largest and most powerful rocket. SpaceX designed it for future missions to the Moon and Mars.
The company expects to start launching Starships from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida within the next few months.
