SpaceX’s Ms. Tree spacecraft was originally called Mr. Steven.
SpaceX
SpaceX marked many boxes with its Monday’s launch of a Falcon 9 rocket carrying the South Korean military satellite Anasis-II: Successfully deployed the satellite. She landed the first stage propeller on a drone in the ocean. She caught both halves of the fairing the first time.
The fairing is the nose cone that protects the load during launch. It opens and falls back to Earth. The two SpaceX ships, Mrs. Tree and Mrs. Chief, caught the two pieces in their wide nets. SpaceX has long sought a clean catch of both fairing halves, so this was a moment worth celebrating.
SpaceX tweeted videos of the captures on Tuesday. They show all the excitement as each fairing lands on its respective net, with a parachute behind.
SpaceX founder Elon Musk also announced the success on Monday, tweeting: “Both fairing halves captured from space by SpaceX spacecraft!”
All of this effort is part of SpaceX’s work to reuse rocket parts to reduce the cost of launches.
The Anasis-II mission is also notable for marking the fastest response time for a rocket reuse. The Falcon 9 booster originally brought NASA astronauts into space on the Demo-2 mission in May, just 51 days before Anasis-II.
