Starship Ship 40 Recovery in a Bad Situation, Can’t Bring It Back Home! What Comes Next...

Good news and bad news. SpaceX has new images of the S40, but the recovery operation may fail. Let's see why and how much chance the S40 has left to return home. Next, let's look at the traces of the Falcon 9 upper stage crash into the moon as seen through a South Korean satellite. Meanwhile, China's land space is preparing for a new launch and landing attempt. Let's find out more on today's episode of Great SpaceX. I believe that despite differing opinions on the S40 recovery, you're all eagerly awaiting the return of this hero to Starbase. But to make a successful flight, it seems that hero is quite exhausted. And now, here they lie in the middle of the ocean, where Poseidon reigns, making rescue efforts unpredictable. That's why you'll need to keep a close eye on things and our channel is your best ally. Subscribe if you haven't already to always receive the latest updates on SpaceX and the aerospace industry. Returning to the S40 updates, previous images of the S40 have mainly come from satellites and rescue teams. We've always been waiting for SpaceX to have images and videos which are sure to be more impressive than anyone else's. And that's what's arrived in SpaceX's latest update. Two images and a 45 second video show the rescue team in a small boat working with the S40. Currently, the S40 appears to be surrounded by buoyancy bags even larger than the rescue team's boat. From my count, there seems to be 13 such bags. Five on each side, plus one on the aft section and two on the nose cone. If correct, this would correspond to the flight number the S40 was participating in. With these bags, the S40 will always remain afloat, leaving only a small portion submerged. This prevents excessive water from entering the vehicle, thus better protecting the internal components. Therefore, one problem in the Starship recovery process has been solved. Many challenges remain, so after this video, you can return to watch a video about the challenges of recovering the S40 on our channel. The link is in the description. But in the seemingly positive update, SpaceX also addressed the issues in the S40 recovery process. The company wrote, the SpaceX recovery team is still working to recover Flight 13's Starship from the Indian Ocean. They've been overcoming challenging conditions and increasingly rough seas as they attempt to guide the 52-meter-long spacecraft to port. Along with that, Elon Musk also stated, Unfortunately, ship recovery is not looking good right now. Indeed, among the factors, rough seas are emphasized by SpaceX. It's one of the weather-related factors. Clearly, the harshness of nature is an even bigger problem than technical factors at this time. In fact, this was already evident. Even before Norman Ranger began towing S40, forecasts showed the ocean currents were moving westward, in the opposite direction of the recovery operation's journey to shore. Therefore, the speed of the recovery barge and S40 was quite slow, only one to two knots per hour, not to mention occasional stops. If traveling at that speed, it could take a month to reach the Australian coast. Furthermore, the Indian Ocean is also prone to tropical storms, making recovery efforts even more difficult. Whenever a storm hits, people and vessels operating offshore must return to shore. No one would dare risk staying there. So with such updates, what will the S40 recall effort look like in the near future? For now, there's still an opportunity to reclaim the S40, which is to take it out of the water. This will definitely require a large barge. And recently, an update said that it seems that a large 12,000-ton barge flying the Liberian flag named Dongbang Giant No. 2 has departed from the east coast of India since July 24th. That is, on the day of launch. The fact that it left the dock on the same day made many people expect that this was a deliberate move by SpaceX. At the time that the reveal was made, Dongbang Giant No. 2 was in the Strait of Malacca, which is north of where S40 landed. If we calculate the distance from India to Australia's Dampier, it's already in the middle. In terms of design, this barge has a large floor area. It's estimated that an S40 can fit on top. Of course, additional holding systems are needed to prevent the vehicle from rolling or bumping when moving. So right now, this barge is a potential candidate. SpaceX can charter this ship, and if hired, maybe SpaceX will change course. S40 will no longer return to Australia, but will be brought directly to Starbase by Dongbang Giant No. 2 with a duration of about one to two months. In addition to quickly removing the S40 from the water, the travel time can also be utilized for initial observation and analysis, although it will not be optimal due to the limitations of support tools. But there's still another possibility that perhaps no one wants. If the challenges are truly so great that a recall by any method is impossible, or too costly, the recall campaign may end. If this decision is made, the S40 will probably be shot down, as SpaceX did with Flight 6's B-13. This booster broke in half after landing, but still had a part floating above the water, so SpaceX seems to have shot it to burn this part so it sank into the sea. This could also apply to the S40 if it has fuel left in it. Of course, S40 is still intact, larger than previous booster fragments, so this destruction attempt will be more difficult. Perhaps you feel very sorry if this happens. But in reality, we are not far from ship recovery. SpaceX is planning to capture the ship on Flight 14. With the advantage of this method, the ship can be brought back to Starbase completely if successful. The data can then be equivalent to or better than what the S40 can deliver. The important thing is that this flight is being targeted for the end of this month, which is not far away. With such an urgent time frame, SpaceX should focus on preparations to help the flight succeed. If successful, they will have data from ship immediately after the flight. It will be sooner than waiting for the S40 to come back, which takes 1-2 months as mentioned. So, which method do you agree with? Do you still want SpaceX to bring back the S40? Let me know with a yes or no with discussion in the comment section down below. Next, let's look at the images of the Falcon 9 upper stage falling onto the moon. The journey of the Falcon 9 upper stage to the moon has been the subject of much recent interest, but I chose to wait until it happened before updating you. This event was fortunately captured by the Korea Pathfinder Lunar Orbiter known as Danuri. It has captured imagery of the crater blasted out by the Falcon 9 upper stage that slammed into the moon early on the morning of August 5th. That collision occurred at 2.34 a.m. EDT, according to KARI officials, right in line with predictions. Scientists calculated some other parameters ahead of time as well. For example, the rocket body probably hit the moon at about 5,400 miles per hour, gouging out a crater up to 89 feet wide. Officials with the Korea Aerospace Research Institute said, Danuri began observations around 30 minutes before the collision and, through orbital control, passed over the impact site multiple times, conducting a total of eight imaging sessions. Through this observation, changes in the terrain around the impact site and traces of ejecta spread were confirmed. Danuri secured both pre-collision and immediate post-collision footage, enabling analysis of changes caused solely by the collision and providing important research data. They added in the ex post, which shared several before and after images of the impact site. This upper stage was launched in a Falcon 9 flight on January 15th of 2025, sending two private robotic moon landers, Firefly Aerospace's Blue Ghost and iSpace's Resilience into a high, moon-crossing Earth orbit. The duo then made their own way to the moon. Blue Ghost landed successfully on March 2nd of that year, but Resilience crashed during its touchdown attempt. The Falcon 9's first stage came back to Earth shortly after liftoff for recovery and reuse, as such boosters commonly do. Falcon 9 upper stages, by contrast, are expendable. SpaceX usually disposes of them in Earth's atmosphere, but the upper stage on the Blue Ghost-Resilience mission uses almost all of its fuel getting its payloads to their distant destination. So the 8,800-pound rocket body remained up there, orbiting Earth until solar gravity and gravitational forces pushed it on a collision course for the moon. The new observations by Danuri, as well as future work by other lunar probes, will help confirm such predictions. CARI officials said in the same statement, The observation data secured by Danuri will be linked with follow-up observations from NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter and utilized in international collaborative research. Danuri is South Korea's first lunar probe. The spacecraft launched on August 4th of 2022 atop a Falcon 9 and began circling the moon four months later. However, this is just the landing of an ineminent piece of hardware. We still hope to see a lander with a human arriving soon. And now let's talk about China's crazy launch and landing plan. Specifically, the Chinese commercial launch company Landspace is set for a second attempt at catching an orbital booster. The startup launched its first Zhuchui-3 rocket in December of 2025 in what was a milestone for Chinese rocket reusability efforts. While the Zhuchui-3's second stage successfully reached orbit, the first stage exploded in a dramatic fireball during its final powered descent toward the landing pad. Now, Landspace is poised for a second attempt at liftoff and landing, with airspace closure notices indicating that launch is scheduled from the Dongfeng Commercial Space Innovation Pilot Zone at Jiuquan Spaceport in northwest China at around 7.45pm EDT on the 10th of August. The company conducted a successful static fire test on June 29 in preparation for the launch. Landspace stated in a post that day on X, all systems operated normally and test data and results met expectations, validating the correctness and coordination of system operations and laying a solid foundation for upcoming flight missions. Zhuchui-3 is a 216-foot stainless steel rocket powered by methane-liquid-oxygen engines. It's similar in capabilities to SpaceX's Falcon 9, and is capable of sending 40,350 pounds of payload to low-Earth orbit. The August 10th launch will be China's fourth orbital booster recovery attempt. The first was the Zhuchui-3, launched in December of 2025. The second was the debut, just days later, of the Long March-12A, which also reached orbit, but with a first stage recovery attempt ending in flames. The third try, using the Long March-10B, took place on the 10th of July. That one was successful. China made history, becoming just the second country to land an orbital booster, in this case, using a vessel equipped with a net capture system. Landspace, when it makes its expected second attempt next week, will use a powered descent and landing legs similar to the Falcon 9. Let's see what possibilities they will create. If you enjoyed today's episode, don't forget to leave a like, subscribe to GreatSpaceX, and ring the notification bell so you never miss the latest updates on Starship, SpaceX, and humanity's exciting journey into the future of space exploration. Thanks for watching, and we'll see you in the next one.