Falcon 9 Milestones Vindicate SpaceX’s ‘Dumb’ Approach to Reuse

SpaceX recently achieved significant milestones in its Falcon 9 rocket reuse program, underscoring the effectiveness of its approach to first-stage recovery. During two consecutive Starlink satellite launches from Florida, SpaceX successfully landed two different Falcon 9 boosters on drone ships. Notably, Booster 1096 completed its second flight and landing, marking the 400th drone ship landing by SpaceX. Meanwhile, Booster 1067 flew for the 30th time—a record for a Falcon 9 booster—highlighting the durability and reusability of these rockets over multiple missions, including crewed flights and international satellite deployments. These achievements come roughly a decade after SpaceX demonstrated the viability of controlled first-stage reentry and landing, beginning with a successful supersonic retropropulsion test in 2013. Despite initial skepticism from industry players, SpaceX’s iterative development led to the first successful ground landing in 2015 and the first drone ship landing in 2016, followed by the first reuse