SpaceX
SpaceX’s first Falcon 9 Block 5 booster casualty battered but still intact in aerial photos
Shortly after successfully sending a reused Cargo Dragon spacecraft on its way towards the International Space Station (ISS), SpaceX Falcon 9 Block 5 booster B1050 experienced an anomaly with its grid fins during a planned landing, resulting in a shockingly soft (but unintentional) landing just off the Florida coast.
By some minor miracle, the drastically off-nominal loads experienced by the booster during its unintended departure from controlled flight somehow did not rise to the bar of structural failure. Nevertheless, now floating a handful of miles east of Port Canaveral’s mouth, B1050 did not make it through the ordeal unscathed.
https://twitter.com/_TomCross_/status/1070742919986991107
A little more than 24 hours after the booster found itself floating sideways in the Atlantic Ocean, B1050 had floated a solid ten miles south of its original position into waters and airspace that no longer fell under the purview of Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, technically a military outpost. As the captains of tugboat Eagle and SpaceX support vessel GO Quest discussed the logistics of returning the booster to port with the local harbormaster and US Coast Guard, Teslarati photographer Tom Cross chartered a local helicopter to get a slightly better view of the waterlogged rocket and its ad-hoc recovery operations.
A casualty of war (with the air)
Second only to the fact that the booster appears to be in disproportionately good shape considering the circumstances, by far the most noteworthy feature of the newest addition to SpaceX’s marine fleet is the sheer damage suffered by B1050’s interstage, the black carbon fiber composite structure that topsFalcon 9 Block 5 boosters and hosts its grid fins and stage separation mechanism.
Revealed from an aerial perspective, it almost looks as if one side of the composite cylinder was smashed with a giant hammer, tearing off at least 20% of the entire interstage – including one of four titanium grid fins – while leaving another large segment hanging on by only partially-figurative carbon fiber threads.
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- Falcon 9 B1050 is seen here shortly before launch with an intact interstage. (Tom Cross)
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- B1050 viewed from Cocoa Beach. (Tom Cross)
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- Falcon 9 B1050’s interstage, or what’s left of it. (Tom Cross)
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- RIP grid fin. (Tom Cross)
It’s not 100% clear why B1050’s interstage was so readily destroyed but a narrative can certainly be drawn from the current public record. After its grid fins lost hydraulic power and became stuck at an extreme angle, B1050 almost immediately lost control and began rapidly and quite brutally spinning and flailing, tossed around as it hurtled through the air at supersonic speeds. Being a predominately smooth cylinder, Falcon 9’s first stage is inherently prone to rotation in the presence of high-velocity air currents, which is why its grid fins are an absolute necessity for maintaining control authority during in-atmosphere “flights”.
Engines stabilized rocket spin just in time, enabling an intact landing in water! Ships en route to rescue Falcon. pic.twitter.com/O3h8eCgGJ7
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) December 5, 2018
In a show that will turn the stomach of anyone familiar with a rocket’s typically narrow load tolerances, Falcon 9 B1050 experienced extreme aerodynamic stresses during the worst of its uncontrolled tumble, to the extent that the entire booster and interstage can be seen visibly twisting at least 5 degrees left and right from the perspective of an onboard camera. In the video above, focus on the center of Falcon 9’s grid fins during the first and last 5-10 seconds to properly visualize the extreme forces at play.
It might look fairly innocent to the untrained eye, but keep in mind that Falcon 9’s interstage is no more than a couple of inches thick and is absolutely massive, stretching 3.7m (~12 ft) in diameter. Perhaps even more importantly, the damage to the interstage has almost without a doubt rendered it unusable from the perspective of SpaceX’s established methods of safely moving and manipulating Falcon 9 boosters.
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- Technicians attach an older interstage-grabber to lift B1046 after its first recovery. (Tom Cross)
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- One of SpaceX’s East Coast interstage jigs is pictured here atop B1049. (Tom Cross)
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- A Falcon 9 Block 5 booster bares its interstage and pusher rod, offering a perfect illustration of its scale. (Bloomberg)
All of those methods rely on adapters that attach to the interstage to lift the rocket vertically or support part of its ~30-ton dry mass horizontally. Lacking a sound interstage, it’s now entirely unclear how SpaceX might go about getting B1050 onto land without damaging it further. In simpler terms, this bodes very, very badly for any plans to safely reuse B1050 in the near (or distant) future. After suffering loads that severely weakened and ultimately tore its interstage to pieces, it’s reasonable to assume that the rest of the rocket’s lithium-aluminum propellant tanks experienced stresses that are at least roughly comparable.
If that’s the case, perhaps the only real hope for B1050’s ‘reuse’ will be the recovery of certain subcomponents and miscellaneous parts that may have made it through the ordeal unscathed or with only minor damage. The three remaining titanium grid fins are a guaranteed recovery, while COPVs, cold gas thrusters, avionics boxes, and maybe even some of its nine Merlin 1D engines could be salvageable with some level of refurbishment.
In the meantime, the tentative plan right now is to two B1050 into Port Canaveral sometime after dawn tomorrow, either ending up at drone ship OCISLY’s berth or another less-developed section of the port.
For prompt updates, on-the-ground perspectives, and unique glimpses of SpaceX’s rocket recovery fleet check out our brand new LaunchPad and LandingZone newsletters!
Elon Musk
SpaceX to launch military missile tracking satellites through new Space Force contract
SpaceX wins a $178.5M Space Force contract to launch missile tracking satellites starting in 2027.
The U.S. Space Force awarded SpaceX a $178.5 million task order on April 1, 2026 to launch missile tracking satellites for the Space Development Agency. The contract, designated SDA-4, covers two Falcon 9 launches beginning in Q3 2027, one from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida and one from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California. The satellites, built by Sierra Space, are designed to bolster the nation’s ability to detect and track missile threats from orbit.
The award falls under the National Security Space Launch Phase 3 Lane 1 program, which Space Force uses to move payloads to orbit on faster timelines and at more competitive prices. “Our Lane 1 contract affords us the flexibility to deliver satellites for our customers, like SDA, more easily and faster than ever before to all the orbits our satellites need to reach,” said Col. Matt Flahive, SSC’s system program director for Launch Acquisition, in the official press release.
SpaceX is quietly becoming the U.S. Military’s only reliable rocket
The SDA-4 contract is the latest in a long string of national security wins for SpaceX. As Teslarati reported last month, the Space Force recently shifted a GPS III satellite launch from ULA’s Vulcan rocket to SpaceX’s Falcon 9 after a significant Vulcan booster anomaly grounded ULA’s military missions indefinitely. That move made it four consecutive GPS III satellites transferred to SpaceX after contracts were originally awarded to its competitor.
This didn’t come without a fight and dates back years. SpaceX originally had to sue the Air Force in 2014 for the right to compete for national security launches, at a time when United Launch Alliance held a near monopoly on the market. Since then, the company has steadily displaced ULA as the dominant provider, and last year the Space Force confirmed SpaceX would handle approximately 60 percent of all Phase 3 launches through 2032, worth close to $6 billion.
With missile defense satellites now part of its launch manifest alongside GPS, communications, and reconnaissance payloads, SpaceX is giving hungry investors something to chew on before its imminent IPO.
Elon Musk
SpaceX files confidentially for IPO that will rewrite the record books
SpaceX files confidentially for a record-breaking IPO targeting a $1.75T valuation and $80B raise, driven by Starlink growth and its xAI merger.
Elon Musk’s rocket and satellite company submitted its draft registration to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission today for an initial public offering, targeting June at a $1.75 trillion valuation. This would be the largest in history.
SpaceX has filed confidentially with the SEC, first reported by Bloomberg. SpaceX would be valued above every S&P 500 company except Nvidia, Apple, Alphabet, Microsoft, and Amazon.
The filing uses a confidential process that allows companies to work through SEC disclosures privately before initiating a public roadshow. With a June target, official details through a formal prospectus is expected to go public in April or early May, after which SpaceX must wait at least 15 days before beginning investor marketing.
While SpaceX is best known for its Falcon 9 and Starship rockets, the $1.75 trillion valuation is anchored by Starlink, its satellite internet service. Starlink ended 2025 with 9.2 million subscribers and over $10 billion in revenue, which is a figure analysts project could reach a staggering $24 billion by the end of 2026. A February all-stock merger with xAI, Musk’s artificial intelligence venture, further boosted the valuation.
SpaceX officially acquires xAI, merging rockets with AI expertise
Bank of America, Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan Chase, and Morgan Stanley are lined up as senior underwriters. SpaceX is also considering a dual-class share structure to preserve insider voting control, and plans to allocate up to 30% of shares to retail investors, which is roughly three times the typical norm.
Elon Musk
Countdown: America is going back to the Moon and SpaceX holds the key to what comes after
NASA’s Artemis II launches Wednesday, sending humans near the Moon for the first time since 1972.
For the first time since Apollo 17 touched down on the lunar surface in December 1972, the United States is sending humans back toward the Moon. NASA’s Artemis II mission is set to launch as early as this week from Kennedy Space Center in Florida, carrying four astronauts on a 10-day journey around the Moon and back to Earth. It will not land anyone on the surface this time, but it is the first crewed flight in over half a century to travel beyond low Earth orbit, and it sets the stage for Elon Musk’s SpaceX missions to follow.
The mission uses NASA’s Space Launch System rocket and the Orion spacecraft, which will fly around the Moon before splashing down in the Pacific Ocean around April 10. For context, an uncrewed Artemis I flew the same path in 2022, proving the hardware worked. Artemis II now tests it with people aboard.
According to NASA’s official countdown blog, launch preparations are on track with an 80 percent chance of favorable weather. “Hey, let’s go to the moon!” Commander Wiseman told reporters upon arriving at Kennedy Space Center.
Source: NASA
Beyond Artemis II lies the lander question, and that is where SpaceX enters directly. In 2021, NASA awarded SpaceX a $2.89 billion contract to develop the Starship Human Landing System, a modified version of Starship designed to ferry astronauts from lunar orbit to the surface. The original plan called for SpaceX to deliver that lander for Artemis III, which was to be the first crewed lunar landing. Timing for Starship development, however, caused NASA to restructure the mission sequence entirely.
Before SpaceX’s Starship Human Landing System (HLS) can put anyone on the Moon, it has to solve a problem no rocket has demonstrated at scale, which is refueling in orbit. Because the Starship HLS requires approximately ten tanker launches worth of propellant loaded into a depot in low Earth orbit before it has enough fuel to reach the lunar surface, SpaceX plans to conduct this refueling process using its upgraded V3 Starship. And until that demonstration flies and succeeds, the Starship moon lander remains a question mark.
SpaceX’s Starship V3 is almost ready and it will change space travel forever
In February 2026, NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman confirmed that Artemis III, now planned for mid-2027, and will instead test lunar landers in low Earth orbit, with the actual landing pushed to Artemis IV that’s targeted for 2028.
Musk responded to earlier criticism of SpaceX’s schedule by posting on X that his company is “moving like lightning compared to the rest of the space industry,” and added that “Starship will end up doing the whole Moon mission.” The contract competition was also reopened in October 2025 by then NASA chief Sean Duffy, who cited Starship’s delays and said the agency needed speed given China’s own stated goal of landing astronauts on the Moon by 2030.
They won’t. SpaceX is moving like lightning compared to the rest of the space industry.
Moreover, Starship will end up doing the whole Moon mission. Mark my words.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 20, 2025
Artemis came from the first Trump administration’s 2017 Space Policy Directive 1, which directed NASA to return humans to the Moon. The program picked up pace through the 2020s, with the Orion spacecraft and SLS taking years to develop at enormous costs. SpaceX entered the picture in 2021 as the chosen lander contractor, tying the commercial space sector into what had historically been an all government undertaking.
Whether SpaceX’s Starship ultimately carries astronauts to the lunar surface or shares that role with Blue Origin’s competing lander, this week’s Artemis II launch is the necessary first step. Getting four humans to the Moon’s vicinity and back safely is the proof of concept everything else depends on.
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