Watch the exact moment SpaceX made history by landing a reused rocket
SpaceX made history last week, and now you can relive that historic moment over and over.
We already know that Elon Musk's SpaceX successfully launched and landed a reused rocket, the first time in its history that's been done, and we know — to paraphrase Joe Biden — it's a big freaking deal.
Now, you can re-watch every second of the groundbreaking landing — from three different camera angles — courtesy of this video that SpaceX posted on its Instagram late Tuesday night.
No matter what angle you view it from, it's an incredible video as the rocket touches the drone ship with such precision that it looks like something straight out of a sci-fi film.
"We just had an incredible day today," Musk said during a live broadcast of the launch. "The first reflight of an orbital class booster did its mission perfectly, dropped off the second stage, came back and landed on the drone ship, right in the bullseye. It is an amazing day I think for space as a whole for the space industry. It means you can fly and refly an orbit-class booster, which is the most expensive part of the rocket."
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SpaceX also uploaded a few images to Flickr to go along with the release of the footage.
Oh, and this wasn't just a simple launch-and-land (as much as something like that can be, you know, simple). The rocket also helped to successfully deploy a communications satellite to geostationary orbit.
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This particular Falcon 9 rocket first launched in April 2016. SpaceX hopes to eventually reduce that year-long turn-around time between launches to make the process far more efficient.
But, for now, just sit back and watch space history be made over and over again.
Marcus Gilmer is Mashable's Assistant Real-Times News Editor on the West Coast, reporting on breaking news from his location in San Francisco. An Alabama native, Marcus earned his BA from Birmingham-Southern College and his MFA in Communications from the University of New Orleans. Marcus has previously worked for Chicagoist, The A.V. Club, the Chicago Sun-Times and the San Francisco Chronicle.
