News
SpaceX team spotted removing Block 5 landing legs prior to teardown analysis
Teslarati photographer Tom Cross has captured SpaceX technicians removing the landing legs from the first Falcon 9 Block 5 booster, signaling that the end of recovery operations are near.
Of note, it appears that SpaceX chose to conduct this recovery much like previous ones by removing the rocket’s legs instead of retracting them, a feature of the Block 5 upgrade prominently noted by CEO Elon Musk and other company officials. A brief time-lapse shows workers carefully removing the legs in a well-worn ballet of heavy machinery, skirting around the massive rocket with expertise developed over the better part of two years of sea and land recoveries of Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy boosters.
There are a number of possible reasons for SpaceX choosing to remove B1046’s landing legs the ‘old-fashioned’ way, most relating to the fact that this particular booster is a critical pathfinder for the entire future of Falcon 9 Block 5. Musk described this attitude in a lengthy and detailed prelaunch briefing:
We are going to be very rigorous in taking this rocket apart and confirming our design assumptions to be confident that it is indeed able to be reused without being taken apart. Ironically, we need to take it apart to confirm that it does not need to be taken apart.
Both COO Shotwell and Musk have briefly discussed the new functionality of the upgraded legs in the past few weeks, indicating that they are capable of being rapidly and repeatedly stowed without being removed from the rocket, whereas all past booster reuse has required the slow removable and equally slow reattachment of landing legs, assuming Block 3 and 4 boosters even reuse their same landing legs. At a minimum, Musk’s above comment already makes it clear that SpaceX has no plans to reuse this booster immediately, instead conducting an extremely thorough teardown analysis to verify that wear and tear from high-speed atmospheric reentry is within an acceptable range.
SpaceX technicians busy themselves removing Falcon 9 Block 5’s massive recovery hardware. (Tom Cross)
Equally plausible, choosing to remove B1046’s landing legs instead of testing the new retraction mechanisms may better preserve the leg hardware in its post-landing state, providing engineers and technicians cleaner and more representative data. One final obvious possibility is that the process of flight-testing new Block 5 leg hardware caused damage or led to some off-nominal telemetry and other visible faults, thus preventing them from retracting.
Because the next Block 5 booster (B1047) is likely nearing its own debut after a thorough round of testing in Texas, captured by an aerial photographer, SpaceX may be pushing hard to complete its post-landing analysis of B1046 as quickly as possible to make way for the imminent launches of several new boosters. If the company hopes to maintain its impressive 2018 flight rate of one launch every two weeks throughout the rest of the year, they will need to refly Block 5 boosters at least 10 times – the last flight-proven commercial Block 4 launch (CRS-15) is currently scheduled for early July, leaving roughly half of all 2018’s upcoming launches manifested on Block 5 Falcon 9/Heavy rockets. Falcon Heavy’s second launch has in fact been pushed back by several months per The Planetary Society, indicating that the construction of the first Block 5 center booster has taken a back seat to the more pressing concerns of Falcon 9 Block 5 boosters, upper stages, and fairings needed to avoid additional customer launch delays.
B1046’s final landing leg is removed and carried off with a forklift, presumably for teardown analysis at a SpaceX facility. (Tom Cross)
Regardless, the first successful and nearly-complete recovery of a Falcon 9 Block 5 booster marks a huge milestone for SpaceX. So long as the imminent teardown analysis does not reveal anything especially unexpected, the rocket company is quickly closing in on true rapid reuse with Octagrabber/Roomba’s steady routinization of robotic rocket saving, yet another intact fairing half recovery, and the good condition of B1046 after a relatively hot reentry and landing.
-
- Just boopin’ an orbital-class rocket with a huge metal component, NBD. (Tom Cross)
-
- (Tom Cross)
-
- A toasty Block 5 landing leg shows off a new patina for SpaceX’s upgraded thermal protection material.
-
- (Tom Cross)
Follow us for live updates, behind-the-scenes sneak peeks, and a sea of beautiful photos from our East and West coast photographers.
Teslarati – Instagram – Twitter
Tom Cross – Twitter
Pauline Acalin – Twitter
Eric Ralph – Twitter
Elon Musk
Elon Musk spotlights the Starlink rescue that got through where no cell tower could
Elon Musk spotlighted how Starlink helped rescuers reach five people stranded in Kazakhstan’s snowy mountains.
Elon Musk put a spotlight on a mountain rescue in eastern Kazakhstan on Sunday, writing “Starlink saves lives” in response to a post describing how SpaceX’s satellite internet helped five stranded people reach emergency crews.
The post from DogeDesigner, which had been viewed more than 500,000 times by Sunday afternoon, said the group’s SUV broke down about 15 kilometers from the village of Kystau Kurchum in an area with no usable mobile network. Starlink carried their call for help and kept them in contact with rescuers, who used the connection to locate them.
The rescue itself took place in October. Local outlet YK.kz reported on October 22 that Kazakhstan’s Ministry of Emergency Situations responded to the breakdown in the Kurchum district of East Kazakhstan region and noted that the group stayed in touch through Starlink. Rescuers covered roughly 100 kilometers in a Trekol, a low pressure tire vehicle built for snow and marshland, then escorted the disabled SUV back to Kystau Kurchum. Nobody needed medical attention.
Starlink saves lives
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 8, 2026
Conditions in the region were rough at the time. Kazakh broadcaster Channel 7 identified the five as hunters caught in a snow trap and said satellite communication allowed rescuers to pinpoint where they were. A spokesperson for the East Kazakhstan emergency department said a storm warning was in effect and urged residents not to leave populated areas unless necessary. The same weather stranded seven utility workers repairing power lines in the nearby Kuygan rural district, according to Tengrinews.
Kazakhstan has been one of Starlink’s more notable markets in Central Asia. Teslarati reported in 2024 that Starlink was serving 1,731 of the country’s 1,879 schools, with the country’s Education Minister saying it had set a new standard for internet service in schools.
Rescue stories like this one have followed Starlink for years, usually in places where ground networks fail or never existed in the first place. Then Florida CFO Jimmy Patronis called Starlink a “game changer” for search and rescue crews during Hurricane Milton, and SpaceX and T-Mobile switched on Starlink Direct to Cell in North Carolina to push emergency alerts to phones after Hurricane Helene.
The next target is dead zones for people who do not carry a dish at all. SpaceX is building out Starlink Mobile and earlier this week selected Qualcomm to supply core infrastructure for a planned terrestrial 5G network in the United States, which it intends to pair with its next generation satellite constellation.
Sunday’s post is at least the third time Musk has written “Starlink saves lives” on X this week, following identical posts on November 5 and November 7.
SpaceX plans to attempt what will be a defining moment in rocket reusability on Starship Flight 15.
As Elon Musk announced in a recent X post, SpaceX will attempt to catch both the Super Heavy Booster and the Starship upper stage during the upcoming orbital flight. If successful, it will mark the first time that all parts of an orbital rocket return to Earth intact, a breakthrough Musk has called essential to making life multiplanetary.
SpaceX will attempt to catch both the Super Heavy booster and Starship on the upcoming flight.
If both are successful, it will mark the first time that all parts of an orbital rocket return to Earth intact.
This is the critical breakthrough needed to make life multiplanetary.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 6, 2026
Previous flights have demonstrated the tower-catch technique with Super Heavy. SpaceX has successfully caught V1 boosters three times (on Flights 5, 7, and 8), with some even reflown. The Ship upper stage has never been caught.
Returning from orbital velocity after deploying payload makes it a significantly harder challenge due to higher energy, heat loads, and the need for precise belly-flop reentry, a flip maneuver, and a final landing burn to settle between the Mechazilla tower’s chopstick arms.
Flight 15, using Booster 22 and Ship 42 (both Block 3 vehicles), is targeted for no earlier than Friday, November 13, 2026, from Orbital Launch Pad 2 at Starbase, Texas. The 75-minute window opens at 4:45 p.m. CT, pending regulatory approval. After hot staging and separation, the booster is planned to return for a catch roughly 6 minutes and 35 seconds after liftoff.
The Ship will insert into a roughly 275 km orbit, deploy 26 advanced Starlink V3 satellites, complete about 14 orbits over more than 22 hours, and—if systems check out—perform a deorbit burn, reentry, flip, and landing burn for a tower catch at approximately T+22 hours 32 minutes.
SpaceX confirms Starship 15 launch window with massive ambitions
A simulation shown during SpaceX’s October earnings call depicted the Ship descending in a belly-flop attitude, flipping upright with a short engine burn, and being captured by the arms:
From simulation to reality
SpaceX is just ONE WEEK away from attempting its most ambitious Starship catch yet https://t.co/nHrxSX6DSz
— X Freeze (@XFreeze) November 6, 2026
Contingency splashdown zones exist in the Gulf of Mexico (booster) and Pacific (Ship) if a catch is not viable. SpaceX has stressed rigorous health checks before committing the Ship to a return-to-launch-site trajectory.
Musk has described the odds of success on this first dual-catch attempt as “more likely than not,” noting a steady stream of additional flights is already scheduled if needed. Full recovery would enable rapid inspection, refurbishment, and reflight—slashing costs and supporting the high launch cadence required for Starlink expansion, lunar missions, and eventual Mars settlement.
As Musk put it, this is “the critical breakthrough needed to make life multiplanetary.”
Tesla Cybercab is going to get some pretty substantial updates, including improvements to efficiency and a new color.
CEO Elon Musk said in a post on X on Saturday that Tesla would be working to refine the Cybercab even more, following the announcement during the week that the company would eliminate the Cybertruck lines within Giga Texas for more Cybercab manufacturing capacity.
“There are efficiency improvements coming that will allow for a 40kWh Cybercab pack,” Musk posted on X. “We will make this in liquid silver, so the colors are not too monotonous.”
There are efficiency improvements coming that will allow for a 40kWh Cybercab pack. We will make this in liquid silver, so the colors are not too monotonous.
The biggest thing most people fail to understand is that there are a very limited number of smart, dedicated people! They can only do so many things.
If we have to maintain a complex production line, supply chain and allocate engineering for Cybertruck, we can’t use those people or factory space and machinery for scaling Cybercab, which is the vehicle that will PROFOUNDLY transform the world of terrestrial transport!
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 7, 2026
A new, more efficient model of the Cybercab will be engineered, which will only help Tesla’s profitability and margins, and it also boosts the argument for why the Cybertruck should be discontinued, at least from a business perspective.
The current Cybercab that operates in the Robotaxi platform in Austin, Texas, has a 48 kWh pack, and it sounds like Musk believes Tesla is on its way to introducing a version that has fewer cells but can manage the same workload thanks to engineering efficiencies.
Credit: Tesla
Musk also doubled down on the decision to prioritize Cybercab production over Cybertruck, which is a decision that has been extremely polarizing within the community, and many fans have made it abundantly clear that they are not particularly pleased with the plans.
“If we have to maintain a complex production line, supply chain, and allocate engineering for Cybertruck, we can’t use those people or factory space and machinery for scaling Cybercab, which is the vehicle that will PROFOUNDLY transform the world of terrestrial transport,” Musk said.
A good look at Tesla’s new Liquid Silver Cybercab, planned with a 40 kWh battery pack following new improvements
😍 https://t.co/IUYsUcCBMs
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) November 8, 2026
Cybercab is obviously Tesla’s path forward in an automotive sense. It seems that Tesla is less concerned about catering to the passenger vehicle market and is more prone to focus on transforming passenger transportation in a way that prioritizes autonomy. However, this requires some sacrifice on Tesla’s end, and the Cybertruck is unfortunately a victim of this.
Cybercab holds an extremely crucial part of Tesla’s future. With the company already revolutionizing passenger transportation once, this is the next phase, and Cybercab is the path forward.
Elon Musk spotlights the Starlink rescue that got through where no cell tower could
SpaceX will perform Starship double catch attempt with Flight 15
