{"title":"Mid-air capture of rocket booster towards reusable rocket technology","authors":"Charlotte Allard","doi":"10.1038/s41578-024-00748-0","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<p>An important engineering achievement was made during the fifth test flight of the SpaceX Starship rocket system, as the Super Heavy booster — responsible for launching the rocket into space — was successfully caught mid-air at the Texas launch pad. After completing its role, the booster separated from the upper stage to reduce weight, allowing Starship to continue its journey. Typically, rocket boosters are either discarded by burning up on re-entry or fall into the ocean, where recovery is challenging and costly. By contrast, the Super Heavy booster is designed to be recovered on land, making reusability far more practical. In the recent test, the booster re-ignited some of its engines to slow its descent and navigated back to the launch site, where it was caught by the launch tower’s giant mechanical arms. This approach to recovering the rocket’s booster marks a key advancement in developing fully reusable rockets, with the aim of reducing costs and turnaround times for future missions.</p>","PeriodicalId":19081,"journal":{"name":"Nature Reviews Materials","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":79.8000,"publicationDate":"2024-10-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Nature Reviews Materials","FirstCategoryId":"88","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1038/s41578-024-00748-0","RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"材料科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"MATERIALS SCIENCE, MULTIDISCIPLINARY","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
An important engineering achievement was made during the fifth test flight of the SpaceX Starship rocket system, as the Super Heavy booster — responsible for launching the rocket into space — was successfully caught mid-air at the Texas launch pad. After completing its role, the booster separated from the upper stage to reduce weight, allowing Starship to continue its journey. Typically, rocket boosters are either discarded by burning up on re-entry or fall into the ocean, where recovery is challenging and costly. By contrast, the Super Heavy booster is designed to be recovered on land, making reusability far more practical. In the recent test, the booster re-ignited some of its engines to slow its descent and navigated back to the launch site, where it was caught by the launch tower’s giant mechanical arms. This approach to recovering the rocket’s booster marks a key advancement in developing fully reusable rockets, with the aim of reducing costs and turnaround times for future missions.
期刊介绍:
Nature Reviews Materials is an online-only journal that is published weekly. It covers a wide range of scientific disciplines within materials science. The journal includes Reviews, Perspectives, and Comments.
Nature Reviews Materials focuses on various aspects of materials science, including the making, measuring, modelling, and manufacturing of materials. It examines the entire process of materials science, from laboratory discovery to the development of functional devices.