Following a mission early on Monday, the first stage of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket entered the record books by becoming the first one to launch and land 27 times.
The Falcon 9 launched from Cape Canaveral in Florida at midnight on Monday, April 14, in a mission that successfully deployed 27 Starlink satellites to low-Earth orbit.
Below is a clip of the record-breaking rocket lifting off on its 27th mission:
To enable reuse of the first stage, SpaceX has developed a system that brings home the booster by landing it upright on the ground or on a barge — described as a “droneship” by SpaceX — floating off the coast of Florida. In Monday’s mission, the rocket landed on the Just Read the Instructions droneship about eight minutes after launch. The video below shows the safe landing, which paves the way for the booster’s 28th flight.
This particular first-stage booster previously launched CRS-22, Crew-3, Turksat 5B, Crew-4, CRS-25, Eutelsat HOTBIRD 13G, O3B mPOWER-A, PSN SATRIA, Telkomsat Merah Putih 2, Galileo L13, Koreasat-6A, and now 16 Starlink missions.
Prior to Monday’s mission, the B1067 booster last flew on February 15 when it also deployed a batch of Starlink satellites to low-Earth orbit.
Reusing the first stage of the rocket has allowed SpaceX to slash launch costs, making spaceflight more affordable for a greater number of commercial firms, government bodies, and scientific institutions, among others, that wish to put satellites into space.
Following a number of failed attempts, SpaceX performed its first Falcon 9 booster landing in 2015, and since then the team behind the technology has nailed the process.
SpaceX engineers have applied what they’ve learned to the next-generation Starship rocket, whose first-stage booster, the 71-meter-tall Super Heavy, descends into the embrace of the launch tower’s giant mechanical arms when it returns to Earth. If you’ve never seen it, the impressive maneuver is definitely worth a look.
SpaceX hopes that with continued development, Starship flights using the same Super Heavy booster will be possible within just a few days, once checks and refurbishment work is complete.
When ready, the Starship is expected to fly crew and cargo to the moon as part of NASA’s Artemis program, and also conduct the first crewed mission to Mars, possibly in the 2030s.