Falcon 9 first stage found, but probably not recoverable

[Arjuna]

The article reports that the first stage achieved a near zero velocity landing. Another critical marker that was achieved, which is closely related, is that the first stage's flight dynamics (i.e., pitch, roll and yaw) were correct. Previously, the first stage was destroyed because the flight dynamics were incorrect. Also, the first stage continued to report telemetry for 8 seconds after the water landing.

Does anyone know if the first stage's landing legs were successfully deployed before the water landing? These are the 4 carbon fiber and aluminum legs (each 25ft / 7.6m long) that would be used to land the stage. I know that Falcon 9 launched with them, but I don't know if they were deployed. My suspicion is that they would have attempted to deploy them as well, for verification and validation purposes.

[Patrick_Devine]

SpaceX hasn't confirmed it, however I would assume that that would be the case. Elon has stated in the past that the legs would provide pitch stability which was missing in the last attempt to relight the first stage. Without it the first stage likely would tumble and a relight would be impossible due to the propellant being centrifuged.

Here's a link which talks about it (about halfway through the article): http://www.space.com/23009-spacex-falcon-9-rocket-launch-tes...

[XorNot]

Damn. Here's hoping they feel confident enough about their guidance to try a land touchdown next time.

[msandford]

If it were me I'd probably try and get an old oil rig that's headed for the scrap yard and put a large, uniform platform on it and try and land on that. If something goes terribly wrong it will happen 20 miles from anything. The majority of rigs don't bob, they either sit on the ocean floor or they're tethered down so the up and down motion that would happen when they're free is actually translated into more or less tension in the anchor cables.

I was thinking "barge" at first but if the seas were rough it'd get tossed about and make landing a disaster.

EDIT: It would probably cost millions for all the steel even at salvage value, but that's probably a lot cheaper than the insurance (if you can even buy it) for having a reusable rocket come back over land and attempt a landing, however remote the location.

[cdash]

They won't be, they are doing another ocean landing in like 4 weeks. But hopefully sometime this year.

[RALaBarge]

The fact that SpaceX has come so far in such a short time is amazing. I am quite confident that they will overcome any technical challenges RE: re-usable first stages

[outworlder]

That's to be expected. But they got some very valuable data out of it.

[cmapes]

Quick correction to the article: Gwynne Shotwell is not the President & CEO, she is the President & COO. It's very well known that Elon Musk is the CEO.

[astrowilliam]

This is an absolutely incredible feat of engineering and science. GO SPACEX!

[nealabq]

For launches over land, how about landing in a lake instead of the ocean? It'd be easier to find, and salt water is corrosive.

[jessriedel]

If you're confident enough that you can safely bring the rocket back over land to a target location like a lake, you might as well land it on the ground. The reason these stages land in the ocean is because it's a big safe place to drop a piece of metal you don't have control of.

[mikeash]

I doubt they care about corrosion. None of the water-landed first stages will actually be reused.