SpaceX - Falcon - Reusable boosters

[mellojoe]

The boosters are supposedly planned to be recoverable, yes? However, the booster seperation will be approximately 500km downrange from the launch site, from what I understand and from comments from Elon Musk. Are these boosters supposed to turn around and come back to the launchsite? Surely not. Where will the site of the booster recovery be? On land, from what I understand, as is the whole point of powered rocket landing as opposed to using parachutes into the sea. Is there a specific targeted site? Is the flight plan of the recoverable boosters to just free fall until a certain altitude, re-fire the engine, re-orient to vertical, and touch-down? Or will it powered-flight to travel to a distant landing site?

[SargeRho]

Turning around is exactly what the boosters will do. After separation, the boosters flip around and reverse their trajectory to head back to the launch pad, and land there propulsively.

Edited April 18, 2014 by SargeRho

[Rakaydos]

I'm prety sure the first stage only gets about 20 km downrange before it's 180 second burnout- easilly enough to compensate for while you're still on the way up.

[Dkmdlb]

If only there was some kind of searchable database where this information could be accessed in

format.

[SargeRho]

Exept that teaches nothing. It doesn't show how the first stage gets to the landing site, only that it lands *somewhere*.

[sojourner]

On the launch today the first stage had reached 55 miles (kilometers?) down range just before main engine cut off. The plan, as restated in the after launch press conference today is for the stage to land back at the launch site.

[Brotoro]

Surely so.

[Doozler]

Here's a video of the "grasshopper" test rocket doing a sideways divert and back again. It almost looks fake!

I wish I could land that well...

[sojourner]

^Meh, that old thing? Here's F9R doing a 250m hop with slight divert to land.