SpaceX almost ditched Starship’s crazy last-second catch

SpaceX nearly jettisoned the Starship’s booster during the fifth Integrated Test Flight (IFT-5) at the last second earlier this month. It can be said that this catch was the biggest achievement in the history of the program, which aims to send humans to Mars in the coming years.

On October 13, SpaceX successfully launched its fifth Starship test flight, followed by a successful landing in the Indian Ocean on the upper stage.

However, the highlight of the launch was SpaceX’s intention to pick up the massive first stage booster, known as Super Heavy, just seven minutes after liftoff.

SpaceX tops off fifth Starship test flight with highly successful booster catch

The launch tower, known as the Mechazilla, used its “chopstick” arms to complete the hunt in one of the coolest things you’ll ever see:

Mechazilla got the super heavy booster! pic.twitter.com/6R5YatSVJX

— SpaceX (@SpaceX) October 13, 2024

However, that almost never happened. SpaceX almost aborted the attempt at the last second, engineers recently told CEO Elon Musk, according to the American “space” website. Space.com website.

While streaming Diablo IV on X last Friday, Musk was talking to three engineers who told him the details of the entire thought process:

“I wanted to be really honest about what happened and what we’re doing about it, because I think that’s our focus on getting to Flight 6. We had a gas abort that was misconfigured and didn’t quite have the right condensation time to increase the spin pressure, and we were a second away One of these stumbles and we asked the missile to stop and try to hit the ground next to the tower instead [landing at] Turret – Like, incorrectly told a healthy missile not to attempt this hunt.

Musk’s response was simple: “Awesome.”

The engineer continued:

“We knew we had a whole bunch of new abortions and we were adhering to the standards and we tried to double check them. I think our concerns were valid, and one of them was very close to biting us.”

Elon Musk said SpaceX’s next Starship launch will likely take place in early 2025. However, the company plans to take things a step further by catching the upper stage as well, Musk said on October 15.

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SpaceX almost ditched Starship’s crazy last-second catch