Elon Musk's SpaceX launches recycled rocket in historic first

A “flight-proven” rocket, as Elon Musk’s SpaceX likes to call it, launched yesterday at 6:27 p.m. and marked the first time that a rocket had flown to orbit, landed vertically and then been reused. The Falcon 9 rocket was launched by SpaceX one year ago. It took years of work and unsuccessful attemps. Back in December 2015, SpaceX landed its first rocket on a landing pad at Cape Canaveral. Few month later they did again at sea. “An incredible milestone in the history of space", excited and emotional Musk said of the launch. The rocket is guided by computer algoriths and GPS navigation. It entered the Orbit, performed circles and turns, and then returned to Earth by firing the engines again until they touch down softly. The goal of the company is to reach Mars.

“This is going to be ultimately a huge revolution in spaceflight, It’s the difference between if you had airplanes where you threw away an airplane after every flight versus you could reuse them multiple times.”

— Elon Musk