Skip to main content

SpaceX successfully launches satellite but rocket crash lands on drone ship again

SpaceX successfully launched a satellite into space on Friday, but its latest attempt to safely return the rocket by landing it on a floating barge once again ended in failure.

Elon Musk, CEO of SpaceX, tweeted that the “rocket landed hard on the drone ship,” adding, “Didn’t expect this one to work.”

Recommended Videos

He said the Falcon 9 rocket’s reentry into the Earth’s atmosphere had been “very hot,” but believes the team stands “a good chance” of nailing the tricky drone-ship landing in its next attempt, which could take place at the end of this month or early next.

Minutes after a flawless launch from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station on Friday night, the Falcon 9 put the SES-9 commercial communications satellite safely into orbit. But the rocket exploded when it landed on the barge floating several hundred miles off the coast of Florida.

The live video feed cut out minutes before the rocket came down, but going by past failed efforts, the landing probably looked something like this one.

Over the last 14 months, SpaceX has seen several of its rockets topple over and explode on touchdown as the team continues to work out how to achieve a safe landing on its floating barge, which is about the size of a football field.

As if the feat wasn’t already complex enough (check out the various stages below), this latest SES-9 mission posed more challenges than usual, a reality which led the team to state that it didn’t have high hopes for this particular landing. Sadly, it was right.

spacex landing diagram
SpaceX
SpaceX

SpaceX has already successfully landed its rocket on solid ground, but achieving a barge landing would give the company more flexibility when planning future missions, which should one day include ferrying astronauts to and from the International Space Station, and, in the long term, trips into deep space. The main goal is to create a reusable rocket system to help take space travel into a new era of affordability and efficiency.

SpaceX clearly still has some way to go before perfecting its technology, but Musk is confident the team will achieve its bold ambitions in time.

Trevor Mogg
Contributing Editor
Not so many moons ago, Trevor moved from one tea-loving island nation that drives on the left (Britain) to another (Japan)…
Cool time-lapse shows SpaceX Crew-10 arriving at space station
SpaceX's Crew-10 arriving at the ISS in March 2025.

Space station astronaut Don Pettit has shared a cool time-lapse of SpaceX’s Crew-10 Crew Dragon spacecraft arriving at the orbital facility on Sunday.

The footage, which runs more quickly than the actual speed, shows the capsule approaching the docking port on the International Space Station (ISS), which orbits at around 250 miles above Earth. Pettit posted a short and long version of the spacecraft's autonomous approach:

Read more
SpaceX will launch Tesla’s humanoid Optimus robot to Mars next year
Optimus Gen 2 humanoid robot by Tesla.

The year 2025 is going to be pivotal for Tesla’s humanoid robot plans, if the words of CEO Elon Musk are to be believed. But next year could mark an astronomical milestone for the company’s Optimus robot, in quite the literal sense.
Taking to X, Musk mentioned in a post that SpaceX will put an Optimus robot on Mars atop its flagship Starship rocket by the end of 2026. Just over a week ago, the Starship broke apart following a launch test, the second such failure this year.
“Starship departs for Mars at the end of next year, carrying Optimus,” Musk wrote in a post on X. “If those landings go well, then human landings may start as soon as 2029, although 2031 is more likely.”
https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1859078074303713447

This won’t be the first time Musk is making such a claim. Back in November last year, Musk mentioned that SpaceX was capable of sending “several uncrewed Starships” to the red planet within a couple of years and that the payload would include Optimus robots.
Tesla introduced a refined version of the Optimus robot at a glitzy event late in 2024. At the event, Musk told the crowd that Optimus was “the biggest product ever of any kind.” It was later reported that the robots were remotely operated by humans at the event.
Later, during the company’s Q4 2024 earnings calls, Musk shed more light on production plans, adding that the product has a revenue potential higher than $10 trillion. He also mentioned plans to manufacture thousands of humanoid robots in 2025.

Read more
Watch SpaceX launch a relief crew for ‘stuck’ Starliner astronauts
At 7:03 p.m. EDT, the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket and Dragon spacecraft, carrying NASA astronauts Anne McClain and Nichole Ayers, JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) astronaut Takuya Onishi, and Roscosmos cosmonaut Kirill Peskov, launched from Launch Complex 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida on Friday, March 14, 2025..

Four astronauts are on their way to the International Space Station (ISS). After several delays, the members of Crew-10 lifted off in a SpaceX Dragon spacecraft using a Falcon 9 rocket from NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida at 7:03 p.m. ET on Saturday night. The crew includes NASA astronauts Anne McClain and Nichole Ayers, JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) astronaut Takuya Onishi, and Roscosmos cosmonaut Kirill Peskov.

“Congratulations to our NASA and SpaceX teams on the 10th crew rotation mission under our commercial crew partnership. This milestone demonstrates NASA’s continued commitment to advancing American leadership in space and driving growth in our national space economy,” said NASA acting Administrator Janet Petro. “Through these missions, we are laying the foundation for future exploration, from low Earth orbit to the Moon and Mars. Our international crew will contribute to innovative science research and technology development, delivering benefits to all humanity.”

Read more