Booster
Booster (now Super Heavy) is the the first stage for Starship, the SpaceX super heavy lift vehicle. The vehicle was announced during the 2019 Dear Moon project presentation by Elon Musk and Yusaku Maezawa.
Super Heavy is a 9m diameter rocket stage, 71m high, powered by 33 Raptor II methane-oxygen engines. The vehicle carries up to 3400 tonnes of propellant.
Super Heavy is intended to be recoverable, with rapid turnaround between launches.
Originally planned to return and land on the launch mound, a second version was supposed to have landing legs.[1] Elon Musk has pointed out that 'the best part, is no part'. The current plan for operating Starship Heavy Boosters is to catch them at the launching/landing tower using a catch arm (Mechazilla) attached to the tower. So they won't need landing legs at all. These elements have been built, and a test program is under way, with three tests done by may 2024. The first landing test, was done on 2024, Oct 13, and was successful.[2]
The high design iteration rate of SpaceX for the Starship launch system means that many solutions may be tested and various solutions used depending on the situation.
