JUST NOW: SpaceX made history as the Starship spacecraft itself returned from orbit and was caught by the mechanical arms of its launch tower in Texas. 🇺🇸 This is a major American engineering achievement. SpaceX has now shown that Starship’s upper stage can reach orbit, deploy a payload, survive the trip home and return accurately enough to be caught at its launch site. Each part of that sequence matters. Recovering the spacecraft gives engineers the vehicle to inspect and potentially prepare for another flight, instead of losing it at sea. That is a substantial step toward SpaceX’s goal of reusing both stages of its largest rocket.