• Source:JND
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SpaceX reached a groundbreaking achievement on Sunday by flying a 232-feet rocket booster back to its launch site and catching it mid-air with two colossal mechanical arms. This marks a significant leap in spaceflight technology, bringing SpaceX closer to its ambitious goals of future Mars exploration and lunar missions with NASA astronauts.

This accomplishment took place during the latest test flight of the Starship rocket, marking significant progress toward SpaceX's long-term goals, including future human missions to Mars and the more immediate objective of landing NASA astronauts on the moon.

The second crucial aspect of today's test flight, the rocket's splashdown in the Indian Ocean, was also successful.

"A big step toward making life multi-planetary was made today," SpaceX CEO Elon Musk wrote on X after the successful fifth flight test of Starship.

What is Elon Musk’s SpaceX Starship Rocket?

Starship is a two-stage rocket, with the "Ship" on top and the Super Heavy booster beneath it.

Starship, the most powerful launch system ever created, is designed to carry up to 100 people on extended interplanetary missions. It will also support satellite deployment, the establishment of a Moon base, and point-to-point travel on Earth.

The first stage of the Starship system, called Super Heavy, is powered by 33 Raptor engines using sub-cooled liquid methane and liquid oxygen. It is designed to be fully reusable and will re-enter Earth's atmosphere to land back at the launch site.

Starship is also engineered to deliver large quantities of cargo to the Moon's surface essential for building a lunar base to facilitate future space exploration for advancing research and human spaceflight efforts. 

Transporting under NASA's Artemis missions, SpaceX will also provide the lunar lander to return astronauts to the Moon's surface for the first time in 50 years. For Mars colonisation, Starship's fully reusable system will make it cost-effective to deliver substantial cargo and crew. With on-orbit propellant transfer, it can transport up to 100 people to Mars or other distant destinations.

How SpaceX Used Mechazilla's 'Chopstick' Arms to Catch Returning Rockets

SpaceX's "Chopstick" mechanical arms catch descending rockets using pincer-like grips at the launch pad. Engineers signal the "go for booster catch" during the rocket's return, and the Flight Director manually commands the catch. Precision guidance is used to secure the rocket, and the catch is considered successful if thousands of criteria are met, including the health of the booster and tower systems.

Earlier in August, SpaceX began testing its launch pad and tower arms in preparation for catching the 232-foot-tall Super Heavy rocket booster following Flight 5. Today’s Starship test marked the first attempt at this challenging tower catch.

During initial tests, the arms repeatedly impacted the sides of a rocket booster cylinder while simulating a catch. Afterwards, one arm was replaced, and testing slowed as the focus shifted to the second-stage Starship. 

Local media footage revealed that the tower arms were tested at least six more times, with some tests involving the arms closing around the booster cylinder without contact and others focusing on their vertical movement around the booster piece.