SpaceX catches Starship upper stage at Texas launch tower for the first time

STARBASE, Texas (Nov. 14) — SpaceX caught the upper stage of its Starship rocket with the mechanical arms of its launch tower on Saturday, the first time the company has recovered the spacecraft after a flight to orbit.

The vehicle, known as Ship 42, returned to SpaceX's Starbase site in South Texas about 22 1/2 hours after lifting off Friday evening on Flight 15. SpaceX confirmed the catch on X at 4:21 p.m. ET, writing, "Mechazilla catches Starship!" NASASpaceflight also reported that the tower had caught the ship, and BBC News said SpaceX had successfully caught the upper stage on its return to Earth.

Flight 15 lifted off at 5:47 p.m. ET Friday from Pad 2 at Starbase, Space.com and the Associated Press reported. Ship 42 reached orbit for only the second time in the Starship program, deployed 26 Starlink V3 satellites and completed about 14 orbits before a 10-second, single-engine deorbit burn at about 3:23 p.m. ET Saturday, according to Space.com's live coverage and SpaceX's webcast. SpaceX spokesperson Dan Huot called it a "good deorbit burn." Earlier Saturday, SpaceX's Kate Tice said all teams, including those watching the heat shield, flaps, guidance and the tower, had polled "go" for the return.

The catch was the first attempt to recover a Starship upper stage with the tower's "chopstick" arms. SpaceX had hoped to catch both stages of the rocket, which would have been the first full recovery of an orbital launch system. That plan ended Friday when Super Heavy Booster 22 aborted its own catch and was diverted to a splashdown in the Gulf of Mexico about 6 1/2 minutes after liftoff. The booster's flight termination system then triggered, and the vehicle exploded a few feet above the water, Space.com and the AP reported.

On Saturday, Tice said early indications were that the booster ended its boostback burn early because of a low fuel mass alarm, after which guidance "detected that it wasn't in the right position" and "correctly aborted itself from the tower catch," Space.com reported. Huot later said the guidance system had performed as designed and that SpaceX was still investigating how the booster got off course. SpaceX has previously caught Super Heavy boosters on three flight tests, according to Space.com.

The official catch clip, about 1 minute 33 seconds long, is SpaceX's post on X. A longer replay of the reentry and catch is available from VideoFromSpace, Space.com's official YouTube channel.