spacex starship: Ship caught by launch tower after orbit for the first time, booster lost at sea

spacex starship has made history on its 15th test flight. After almost a day in orbit, the Starship upper stage, known as Ship 42, flew back to its launch site and was caught by the launch tower's mechanical arms. It is the first time a Starship upper stage returning from orbit has been caught this way. The plan to catch the Super Heavy booster on the same flight, however, did not work out.

What happened

Flight 15 lifted off on Friday (US time) from SpaceX's Starbase site in Texas. Ship 42 reached a low orbit of about 275 km and circled the Earth about 14 times. During the flight it released 26 next-generation Starlink V3 internet satellites. Three of them carried cameras that photographed the ship's heat shield and other hardware.

After more than 22 hours in space, the ship fired its engine to leave orbit (the deorbit burn) and re-entered the atmosphere. In the final phase it flipped upright, slowed down on its engines, moved in beside the tower and was gripped by the two mechanical arms known as the "chopsticks".

The catch happened at about 3:20 pm US Central Time on Saturday, which was about 3:20 am on Sunday, 15 November in Bangladesh.

What happened to the booster

A major goal of this flight was to catch both stages of the rocket, the Super Heavy booster below and the ship on top, on the same mission. But after stage separation the booster's planned tower return was called off, and it came down in the Gulf of Mexico instead. So the goal of recovering both stages together was not met this time.

Why it matters

• SpaceX has caught and reused Super Heavy boosters before, but catching a ship returning from orbit was the hardest step. Now it has been done.
• If both stages can be reused again and again, the cost of sending satellites, cargo and people to space could fall sharply.
• A fully reusable Starship is at the centre of SpaceX chief Elon Musk's plans for missions to the Moon and Mars.
• Starship also has to fly regularly to launch the new Starlink V3 satellites at scale.

What comes next

Engineers will now study the flight data and the camera images to judge whether the vehicle is in a state to fly again. SpaceX's stated aim is to bring back and reuse both the booster and the ship routinely. No date has been announced for the next flight.

Sources: reports by Teslarati, Oneindia and Madhyamam.