Watch the second SpaceX Super Heavy booster catch from epic angles

SpaceX has released pictures and videos of the second Super Heavy booster catch from the recent Starship Flight 7, showing some epic angles of this massive rocket test.

Super Heavy is part of the integrated Starship Flight, it takes the rocket to space with 33 Raptor engines, generating more than 16 pounds of thrust at the liftoff. With its reusable design, the ship comes back to the launch site and secures landing on the launch/catch tower.

The company has a flight safety protocol for first-stage booster, which means, that both the booster and the launch tower must meet these safety parameters to attempt a catch.

SpaceX Super Heavy Booster Catch (credit – SpaceX)

Take Flight 6 for example, the company didn’t attempt a launch due to the launch tower chopstick sensors, which were managed during the liftoff. Eventually, the booster had to splashdown in the Gulf of Mexico.

Prior to Flight 7, SpaceX had made several upgrades to the launch tower including higher protection for these sensors and installed radars to improve distance detection on the descending vehicle.

In the recent flight, the ship successfully returned from hot-staging and performed a final burn with 13 Raptor engine relit to slow down and switching to 3 engines to navigate to launch tower chopsticks.

After that, the first stage was clamped down with the arms and placed on the launch mount for recovery. Watch the second SpaceX Super heavy booster catch below.

The second successful catch of the Super Heavy booster pic.twitter.com/FanOyDoE8Z

— SpaceX (@SpaceX) January 18, 2025