SpaceX on Sunday successfully landed its Falcon 9 rocket for the sixth time.
The two-stage spacecraft left Florida’s Cape Canaveral Air Force Station early Sunday morning, carrying commercial communications satellite JCSAT-16 to a Geostationary Transfer Orbit (GTO).
As detailed by the SpaceX Twitter account, the process went smoothly: With the Falcon 9 first-stage entry burn underway, JCSAT-16 continued into orbit. The Space Systems Loral (SSL) telecommunications satellite carried Ku-band and Ka-band transponders, which will function as an in-orbit backup to Tokyo-based SKY Perfect JSAT Corporation’s existing services.
SpaceX’s reusable rocket, meanwhile, braved extreme velocities and re-entry heating to land safely on Of Course I Still Love You, a ship stationed a few hundred miles from Florida in the Atlantic Ocean.
Traditionally, capsules crash into the ocean because getting them to land upright and intact is a complicated engineering feat. But getting it right means space firms like SpaceX can save money and time by reusing rockets rather than deploying new ones for each flight.
SpaceX in January 2015 attempted its first landing of a Falcon on a “drone spaceport ship”: The reusable rocket made it to its water-based target, but came down too hard during the landing and was destroyed.
The third time was the charm for Elon Musk’s firm, which completed its first rocket landing on dry land during an orbital launch in late December. It wasn’t until April, however, that the company managed to dock its Falcon 9 rocket on a landing platform in the Atlantic Ocean.
