The rocket booster was positioned vertically by SpaceX crew on Saturday on the intersection of Crenshaw Blvd. and Jack Northrop Ave., southeast of SpaceX’s main building.
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The upgraded first stage of the Falcon 9 rocket kissed outer space on December 21, 2015, and returned to Earth in good condition, gently touching down on Landing Zone 1 in Cape Canaveral.
A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket launched from the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station on August 14 carrying the JCSAT-16 communications satellite for Tokyo’s SKY Perfect JSAT.
It was the first launcher stage SpaceX recovered after years of effort, during which the company switched from a plan to retrieve rockets with parachutes to an outside-the-box scheme involving multiple engine restarts, landing legs, and precision landing algorithms.
The first-stage booster that’s now on display traveled by truck from Florida to Hawthorne.
Then the rocket began a supersonic descent, and the trio of Merlin engines fired again for a re-entry burn. It made history as the first time SpaceX successfully completed a vertical first stage landing.
“Welcome back, baby!” SpaceX founder Elon Musk tweeted after touchdown.
In 2012, SpaceX became the first commercial company to rendezvous with the International Space Station utilizing Falcon 9 and Dragon.
The rocket is a landmark on SpaceX’s drive toward reducing launch costs by being able to reuse costly equipment like the first-stage booster that in a traditional launch would fall into the ocean when it was expended.
After the recovery, SpaceX has successfully landed five Falcon 9 stages.
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More photos of the Falcon 9 rocket going on display are posted below.
