This article was published on April 8, 2016

SpaceX finally lands its rocket on a drone ship after delivering bouncy castle for ISS


SpaceX finally lands its rocket on a drone ship after delivering bouncy castle for ISS

SpaceX has finally landed its Falcon 9 rocket on a drone ship, following four failed attempts.

Before landing, the rocket had been on mission to deliver cargo for the International Space Station. It included an inflatable habitat – basically a bouncy castle, in space.

Elon Musk, CEO of SpaceX, has been working hard to commoditize space travel by creating a reusable rocket. It turns out, that’s a lot easier said than done.

SpaceX has been trying to land the rocket since 2014. It was finally able to do so in December, following Jeff Bezos’ successful attempt a few weeks earlier with his Blue Origin company.

That was on solid ground, however. Today’s landing means SpaceX is closer to being able to deploy its rocket from anywhere, and have it arrive virtually anywhere in the ocean thanks to the drone ship.

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