Liftoff from Starbase
Starship and its Super Heavy booster lift off from Starbase, Texas, opening Flight 5 — the first attempt to bring the booster all the way back to the launch tower.
October 13, 2024: SpaceX catches a 232-foot Super Heavy booster out of the sky with the launch tower's "chopstick" arms — a first in rocketry, tracked minute by minute from liftoff to splashdown.
Starship and its Super Heavy booster lift off from Starbase, Texas, opening Flight 5 — the first attempt to bring the booster all the way back to the launch tower.
All 33 Raptor engines on Super Heavy fire together, producing 16.7 million pounds of thrust — nearly double NASA's Space Launch System rocket.
At T+2:33 — eight seconds earlier than the previous flight — Super Heavy shuts down its engines, timed deliberately to help bring the booster home for the catch.
Starship's six engines ignite to push the ship away from the spent booster; the vented hot-stage ring is then jettisoned to shed weight before the booster's trip home.
Its boostback burn complete, Super Heavy flips around and heads back toward Starbase, while Starship continues on its own suborbital arc toward the Indian Ocean.
At T+6:56 the booster's landing burn shuts down as it slides into position between the tower's two "chopstick" arms — a maneuver requiring thousands of health checks and a manual go-ahead from the flight director.
The arms close around Super Heavy for the first successful booster catch in rocketry history. SpaceX president Gwynne Shotwell's reaction, posted minutes later: "I don't know what to say!"
While Starbase celebrates, Starship keeps coasting — reaching a peak altitude of 212 km before beginning its long arc toward a splashdown zone in the Indian Ocean.
Ship 30 flies with a rebuilt heat shield — new tiles plus an ablative backing layer — and comes through re-entry in noticeably better shape than the previous flight, despite some flap damage.
1 hour, 5 minutes and 40 seconds after liftoff, Starship splashes down in the Indian Ocean beside a pre-positioned buoy. Musk posts minutes later: "Ship landed precisely on target!"
About 16 seconds after splashdown, Ship 30 — never meant to be recovered — tips over and erupts in a fireball, caught on camera by the buoy stationed nearby.
NASA administrator Bill Nelson posts his congratulations "on its successful booster catch and fifth Starship flight test today," tying it to Artemis's return-to-the-Moon plans.
Retired Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield calls the catch a major leap forward for what humans can now do in space — echoed across the industry, including congratulations from rivals like Blue Origin.