Up until recently, there had been very few RTLS (Return To Launch Site) SpaceX missions. This is where a Falcon 9 first stage boosts back toward the coast after separating from the second stage and then lands at Cape Canaveral. The first month of 2022 brought an end to this RTLS drought! In January, there were two such missions: Transporter-3 on Jan. 13 and CSG-2 on Jan. 31. In this article, we will focus on the former mission.

Transporter-3 took off from SLC-40 (Space Launch Complex 40) at 10:25 a.m. It represented SpaceX’s third satellite rideshare mission. In Falcon 9’s payload fairing, there were a whopping 105 spacecraft waiting to be released into low Earth orbit. These spacecraft came from a wide array of companies such as Exolaunch, Nanoracks, and Spaceflight, to name a few. They paid SpaceX for access to standardized ports, which is where their payloads are adapted to on the rocket. Getting back to the launch, Emerson was positioned in Cocoa Beach to document this flight. She captured fellow onlookers looking up at the rocket as it ascended. Multiple seagulls can also be seen standing on the beach and flying through the frame. Moments before stage separation, she took a photo of Falcon 9’s incredibly long exhaust trail as it flew parallel to the beach.

Approximately two and a half minutes into flight, Falcon 9’s first stage booster separated from the second stage. After separation, the booster flipped around using cold gas thrusters, in order to face toward the coast, and then applied some thrust to send it back toward Cape Canaveral. After a few minutes of coasting through space, the booster began to descend into the thicker parts of Earth’s atmosphere. To prevent it from disintegrating in a ball of plasma, an “entry burn” was performed to slow the vehicle down and subsequently reduce frictional heating. A little over a minute of further descent and the booster was ready to perform its landing burn! Emerson was perfectly positioned to capture this iconic spectacle. In her photo, you can see a large group of people at the pier watching the booster descend toward LZ-1 (Landing Zone 1).

SpaceX plans to launch many more of these rideshare “Transporter” missions. If you ever get the chance, we highly recommend visiting Jetty Park or Cocoa Beach to witness this amazing feat of engineering firsthand. We hope you enjoyed our coverage of this mission and look forward to sharing more spaceflight news with you.