---
title: "SpaceX’s Historic Launch Proves Recycled Rockets Are the Future of Space Exploration"
description: "SpaceX made history today by successfully re-launching and re-landing a used Falcon 9 rocket booster for the first time."
date: "2017-03-30"
modified: "2017-03-31"
authors:
  - name: "Sarah Marquart"
    link: "https://futurism.com/authors/sarah_fqtq"
url: "https://futurism.com/spacex-just-made-history-with-the-first-launch-and-landing-of-a-previously-used-falcon-9-booster"
categories:
  - "Space"
  - "SpaceX"
tags:
  - "elon musk"
  - "falcon 9"
  - "SpaceX"
---

# SpaceX’s Historic Launch Proves Recycled Rockets Are the Future of Space Exploration

![](<https://futurism.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/southtowerhorizontal.jpg>)
*\<em\>Image: SpaceX\</em\>*

SpaceX has long said it would like to make its entire Falcon 9 rocket reusable. Today, Elon Musk's [company made history](<http://www.spacex.com/webcast>) by successfully relaunching and re-landing a used Falcon 9 rocket booster for the first time. The [SES-10 mission](<http://www.spacex.com/webcast>) marks a "historic milestone on the road to full and rapid reusability as the world’s first re-flight of an orbital class rocket." Falcon 9’s first stage for the SES-10 mission previously supported the successful CRS-8 mission in April 2016.

In an interview after the launch, Musk called it a "huge revolution in spaceflight."

![SpaceX’s Historic Launch Proves Recycled Rockets Are the Future of Space Exploration](<https://futurism.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/Screen-Shot-2017-03-30-at-6.36.31-PM.png>)
*SpaceX*

The recycled rocket carried a satellite into orbit for SES, a Luxembourg-based [telecommunications company](<https://www.ses.com/>), which will provide internet and television service for Central and South America.

In order for [commercial space travel](<https://futurism.com/will-spacexs-moon-tourists-survive-the-trip-across-the-cosmos>) to be viable, companies like SpaceX have to make it more affordable. Currently, the Falcon 9 costs about $62 million. However, Gwynne Shotwell, SpaceX's COO, says reusing a rocket booster could result in a [30 percent discount](<http://www.businessinsider.com/spacex-recycled-booster-launch-2017-3>) per launch, saving companies more than $18 million.

"This is an amazing day for space as a whole," said Musk post-landing, "for the space industry it means you can fly and re-fly an orbital class booster, the most expensive part of the rocket."

"This is potentially revolutionary," [John Logsdon](<https://elliott.gwu.edu/emeritus-faculty#logsdon>), a space policy expert and historian at George Washington University's Space Policy Institute, told *[Business Insider](<http://www.businessinsider.com/spacex-revolutionary-recycled-booster-launch-2017-3?utm_content=buffer48c81&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook.com&utm_campaign=buffer-science>)*. "Reusability has been the Holy Grail in access to space for a long, long time."

### Author social links  
[Facebook](<https://www.facebook.com/sarah.marquart>)  
[LinkedIn](<https://www.linkedin.com/in/sarah-marquart-ba7aa38b>)  
[Twitter](<https://x.com/sagaofsarah>)