Flight 10's Starship upper stage splashed down approximately 3 meters from its intended target after reentry. The upper stage completed mission objectives while the Super Heavy booster also met its goals. Reentry produced visible damage: a heat shield scorched golden-brown, parts of the aft skirt were missing, and flaps and other surfaces showed heavy stress. Mission planning included intentionally missing tiles and maneuvers designed to stress control surfaces. Despite that damage and stress, the vehicle executed a flip and landing burn that achieved the highly accurate splashdown position. Images and video documented the landing burn, splashdown, and recovery operations.
SpaceX CEO Elon Musk recently shared an insane feat accomplished by Starship's upper stage during its tenth test flight. Despite the challenges it faced during its return trip to Earth, Flight 10's Starship upper stage demonstrated impressive accuracy when it came to its target landing zone. Musk's update was shared on social media platform X. In a conversation about Starship upper stage's return to Earth, Musk revealed that the upper stage splashed down just 3 meters (under 10 feet) from its intended target. Considering the size of the Starship upper stage and the ocean itself, achieving this accuracy was nothing short of insane.
View of Starship landing burn and splashdown on Flight 10, made possible by SpaceX's recovery team. Starship made it through reentry with intentionally missing tiles, completed maneuvers to intentionally stress its flaps, had visible damage to its aft skirt and flaps, and still executed a flip and landing burn that placed it approximately 3 meters from its targeted splashdown point," SpaceX noted.
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