> SpaceX’s president, Gwynne Shotwell, estimates that reusing these landed Falcon 9 vehicles will lead to a 30 percent reduction in launch costs, according to Space News.<p>Surely it will be more than a 30% reduction once they make the rocket refactoring process more efficient? I've heard Elon say that the savings would be an order of magnitude given how low the cost of fuel is relative to everything else on the rocket.<p>I know Elon is famously optimistic and Gwynne is probably dampening expectations on purpose but 30% doesn't seem very impressive. Is Gwynne just playing down the cost savings or is she likely to be accurate, even in the medium term (3-5 years)?
What could SpaceX have learned about landing a rocket on a boat resting on waves?<p>It seems like the craziest idea. I would have said "No chance. Land it on land, like the word says." but they've managed the risks down to where it's not surprising that they've landed yet another one. Some special magic has gone into that and I can't even imagine what issues they've had to solve.
My daughter and I saw a couple of strange flashes in the sky while out looking for Perseids last night. We're in the UK and the flashes were in Cassiopeia in the North Eastern sky at about 10pm BST, is possible they could have been from this rocket?