SpaceX successfully launches Falcon 9 rocket and lands the booster, but misses the fairing catch
https://techcrunch.com/2019/12/16/spacex-successfully-launches-falcon-9-rocket-and-lands-the-booster-but-misses-the-fairing-catch/
SpaceX has successfully launched its 13th rocket this year, and its 11th Falcon 9 (the company also flew two Falcon Heavy missions in 2019). The launch included the re-use of a twice flown Falcon 9 booster stage, which it recovered again with a landing at sea aboard one of its droneship landing pads, and a recovery attempt of both halves of the nose cone fairing that protects the spacecraft’s cargo and that is shed before the upper stage reaches its target orbit.
This launch carried a Boeing-built satellite that was created to provide communications services for customers Kacific and SKY Perfect JSAT, and it seems to have delivered the payload to the target orbit as planned. But primary mission success is only half the story here – and the other half is key to SpaceX’s efforts to make even more of its launch system reusable over time.