Elon Musk shares clip showing tower to launch and catch SpaceX's massive Starship; Watch

Elon Musk-owned SpaceX is preparing for the first orbital launch of its Starship spacecraft, the success of which will cement the reach of humans to Mars. The much-awaited flight of the potential vehicle to Mars will take the mighty rocket to newer heights as previous Starship flights touched altitudes no more than 10 kilometres. Meanwhile, the next launch, which got delayed from late 2021 is likely to be conducted this year and SpaceX is all prepared to make it a success. In days leading up to the launch, CEO Elon Musk on Twitter has shared a drone shot of a tower that will be used to both launch and catch the 165-foot-tall Starship. 

The next-generation Starship is being developed at the Starbase facility in Boca Chica, Texas, and it basically consists of two major parts, the Starship spacecraft, which will be used to carry cargo and crew, and the Super Heavy booster. The tower which is standing tall at the Starbase facility, will be used to launch the spacecraft and catch the super-heavy booster once it escorts the upper stage into Space and detaches to descend. In an artistic video shared by another Twitter user, the tower can be seen latching on to the booster once it ascends after launching the upper stage into space. Take a look at the clip below.

The need of having a tower arose as unlike the booster used in SpaceX's Falcon rockets, Starship's super heavy booster does not have a landing or launching leg. SpaceX did not bother to provide legs to the booster as the its main job is to carry payload into space with higher efficiency, something which can be achieved if it launches without the extra weight of the legs. According to Musk, the tower would also reduce the turnaround time as a second starship can be launched in a short time once the booster is fuelled. 

Starship's launch

During a virtual meeting of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine Space Studies Board in November, Musk had revealed that Starship will "hopefully" take off in 2022. He has also stated that SpaceX will look to conduct a bunch of other Starship tests and eventually progress towards the launch of commercial payloads. The launch was postponed from December 2021 due to environmental assessments by the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) regarding the impacts of Starship's launch.

Image: Twitter/@Elon Musk, AP