The booster rocket landing starts on 35:55 mark of the video above.
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla.—SpaceX resumed station deliveries for NASA on Friday, and in a double triumph, successfully landed its booster rocket on an ocean platform for the first time.
The unmanned Falcon rocket soared into a clear afternoon sky, carrying a full load of supplies for the International Space Station as well as a futuristic pop-up room.
After sending the Dragon capsule on its way, the first-stage booster peeled away. Instead of dropping into the Atlantic like leftover junk, the 15-story booster steered to a vertical touchdown on the barge, named “Of Course I Still Love You.”
Hundreds of SpaceX employees gathered outside the company’s glassed-in mission control in Hawthorne, California, cheered wildly, jumped up and down, and chanted, “USA, USA, USA!.”
“Absolutely incredible,” said a SpaceX commentator. “The crowd is going a little nuts here, as expected.”
Although the company managed to land a spent booster rocket at Cape Canaveral in December, touchdowns at sea had proven elusive, with several attempts ending in explosions on the floating barge. SpaceX’s founder Elon Musk wants to ultimately reuse rocket parts to shave launch costs.
