SpaceX managed to catch the Super Heavy booster on the first attempt, and on only the rocket’s fifth test flight. So what happens next?
It was an astonishing spectacle. A 70-meter-tall SpaceX rocket performing a controlled descent toward a tiny target where two giant mechanical arms were waiting to clasp it just meters above the ground.
Sunday’s bold effort was SpaceX’s first try at “catching” the Super Heavy booster, and to many people’s surprise, it nailed it.
So, now what?
Well, the immediate goal for SpaceX is to use the Super Heavy booster to carry a modified version of the Starship spacecraft — called the Starship Human Landing System (HLS) to a lunar orbit in NASA’s Artemis III mission, which could take place as early as 2026.
But until that can happen, the Elon Musk-led spaceflight company will need to carry out many more tests of the Starship system, which comprises the first-stage Super Heavy booster — the most powerful ever to fly — and the upper-stage Starship spacecraft.
