Amazon’s Jeff Bezos Welcomes Elon Musk ‘To the Club’ After Rocket Landing

The Falcon 9 rocket on Monday night made a flawless touchdown – upright and on hard ground – at Cape Canaveral, Florida, marking the first time for Elon Musk and his team to achieve the incredibly complicated maneuver.

The upgraded 23-storey tall rocket delivered 11 ORBCOMM communication satellite into the low Earth orbit.

The successful landing could pave the way for the use of reusable rockets in future and will give a huge boost to privately-owned space exploration companies such as SpaceX.

“There and back again”, tweeted Musk.

The rocket launch was the first carried out by Space X since June when an unmanned Falcon exploded minutes after lifting off from Cape Canaveral. Creating reusable rockets is important for lowering the cost of space travel, which could make space tourism and a trip to Mars more feasible.

When the rocket landed, a SpaceX commentator announced, “The Falcon has landed”.

Then in an even more incredible feat, it landed the 15-story leftover booster back on earth safely.

The launch and landing also marked the first time any company has landed an orbital rocket segment back on Earth following a launch to space. The first stage of the Falcon 9 rocket touched down surface successfully at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station after three failed attempts previously.

Initially, the launch of ORBCOMM satellites was set for Sunday, but SpaceX had postponed the launch in order to improve the chances of a smooth and successful landing. It was designed and manufactured by US Space Company SpaceX for the reliable and safe transport of satellites and the Dragon spacecraft into orbit.

As the heads of the two firms trade barbs, a new, privately-funded space race seems to be developing as companies rush to corner both the market for satellite launches and eventually manned commercial flights.