On October 13, 2024, SpaceX caught a returning Super Heavy booster with the mechanical arms of its Starbase launch tower. The spectacular maneuver was the first successful tower catch of a Super Heavy—but it was not a catch of the entire Starship vehicle. The Starship upper stage continued around much of Earth and ended its test with a controlled splashdown in the Indian Ocean.
Watch SpaceX’s official Flight 5 replay and then follow the sequence below to see what the video actually demonstrates.
What the video shows
Starship and Super Heavy lifted off together from Starbase, Texas. After ascent, the two stages separated using hot staging: Starship began firing its engines while still close to the booster.
Super Heavy then reversed course in a boostback burn, coasted toward the launch site and reignited engines for its descent. Near the tower, it aligned itself vertically. Two enormous movable arms—nicknamed the “chopsticks”—closed around the booster’s forward structural interfaces and held it beside the tower.
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That distinction matters: the booster was intercepted and supported by the arms. It did not land on a conventional pad or touch down on the tower.
Flight 5 sequence
| Stage | What happened |
|---|---|
| Liftoff | Starship/Super Heavy launched from Starbase. |
| Staging | Starship ignited its engines during hot-stage separation. |
| Boostback | Super Heavy burned its engines to reverse course toward Starbase. |
| Descent | The booster guided itself back through the atmosphere and performed a landing burn. |
| Catch | The launch tower’s chopstick arms captured Super Heavy on SpaceX’s first catch attempt. |
| Upper-stage finish | Starship completed reentry and a landing burn before splashing down in the Indian Ocean about 1 hour, 5 minutes, 40 seconds after launch. |
SpaceX’s Flight 5 account describes the booster catch and the upper stage’s separate splashdown.
What are Mechazilla and the chopsticks?
“Mechazilla” is SpaceX’s informal name for the tower-based system that helps integrate, stack, launch, service and recover Starship hardware. Its two large arms are commonly called the chopsticks.
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The Starbase tower is approximately 480 feet tall. SpaceX designed it not only as launch infrastructure but also as a recovery and handling system; its arms can place a caught booster near the launch mount for inspection and preparation. The company’s stated rationale is that a vehicle caught by the tower may need less onboard landing hardware and can be handled close to the point of launch. Those are design goals and potential advantages, not proof of a particular cost saving.
See SpaceX’s Starbase overview for the tower’s stated functions and dimensions.
Why catching a booster is so difficult
Super Heavy had to return toward an active launch complex while controlling its engines, trajectory and aerodynamic loads. The final approach required precise alignment with arms that could not simply absorb an arbitrary impact.
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- Engines had to relight and deliver the required thrust during boostback and descent.
- Guidance had to steer the booster to a narrow volume beside the tower.
- The vehicle and arms had to tolerate the structural loads of capture.
- Launch-site personnel, nearby infrastructure and public-safety zones had to remain protected.
- Vehicle and tower systems had to report acceptable health before the attempt was authorized.
SpaceX said thousands of vehicle and pad criteria had to be satisfied before the catch could proceed. The Federal Aviation Administration’s Flight 5 review also addressed sonic booms, landing operations, maritime safety areas and the water-deluge system. Relevant regulatory material is available in the FAA’s Starship activity archive and its written re-evaluation.
Why use a tower catch?
SpaceX’s long-term Starship plan calls for both stages to be rapidly reusable. A tower catch could support that objective in several ways:
- Removing or reducing landing legs and other recovery hardware could help limit vehicle mass.
- Recovered hardware would arrive beside the launch infrastructure rather than requiring transport from a distant landing site.
- The same system could potentially support inspection, stacking and turnaround.
These are engineering objectives. Flight 5 did not establish routine rapid reuse, a refurbishment schedule or commercial launch economics.
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What happened to the Starship upper stage?
The upper stage was not caught. After separation, it continued its own flight, reentered the atmosphere, performed a controlled flip and landing burn, and splashed down in its planned Indian Ocean area.
SpaceX’s architecture ultimately calls for Starship itself to return and be caught by the tower. That remains a separate challenge from recovering Super Heavy. A splashdown demonstrates controlled flight and reentry; it is not the same as recovering a vehicle for another launch.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.What Flight 5 proved—and what it did not
Demonstrated during the test
- Super Heavy ascent and hot-stage separation.
- A controlled boostback and return.
- Engine relight and a landing burn.
- Precise alignment with the launch tower.
- The first successful mechanical tower catch of a Super Heavy booster.
- Controlled Starship reentry and splashdown.
Still unproven after Flight 5
- Immediate relaunch of the caught booster.
- Routine booster turnaround and refurbishment.
- Recovery of the Starship upper stage.
- Full two-stage reuse in regular operations.
- Commercially proven launch costs or a crew-rated Starship system.
It was therefore a foundational demonstration, not the completion of an airline-like reusable launch service.
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Flight 6 showed why the safety gate matters
On November 19, 2024, Starship Flight 6 did not repeat the catch. Automated health checks identified conditions involving critical tower hardware, so the catch attempt was aborted. Super Heavy diverted and made a planned soft splashdown in the Gulf of Mexico instead.
The event, documented in SpaceX’s Flight 6 account, illustrates an important feature of the system: reaching the tower is not enough. The vehicle must be healthy, the tower must be ready and the combined conditions must be safe. A divert is an intended recovery mode, not necessarily a loss of control.
How significant is the achievement now?
SpaceX had already landed and reused Falcon 9 boosters, so Flight 5 was not the first reusable-rocket recovery in history. Its distinction was the first successful tower catch of a Super Heavy, a much larger booster and one half of a planned two-stage reuse architecture.
As of August 18, 2026, SpaceX company materials describe booster reusability as demonstrated while still identifying the catch and reuse of the Starship upper stage as a remaining technical milestone. The current status is summarized in the company’s Project Apex Roadshow document.
The footage looks futuristic because the recovery method is genuinely unusual: instead of landing on legs, the booster returns to the launch tower and is caught in midair. But the accurate takeaway is narrower and more meaningful. SpaceX proved that it could perform this difficult Super Heavy catch once; it had not yet proved complete, rapid, two-stage reuse.
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