Yes, there are plans for Mechazilla to catch the Starship spacecraft in addition to the Super Heavy Booster. Elon Musk has confirmed that future Starships, especially those used for missions near Earth, will be retrievable using the Mechazilla tower. This includes the capability for Mechazilla to catch Starship without landing legs, as those are deemed necessary only for missions landing on the Moon or Mars where local infrastructure does not yet exist. This development is part of SpaceX's broader strategy to achieve rapid reusability of their spacecraft, significantly reducing turnaround time between launches. The anticipation among enthusiasts and SpaceX itself is evident, with several posts on X expressing hopes for successful catches in upcoming test flights to further this goal.
If this becomes possible, I have a bad feeling I’m going to be seeing a lot more of my unhinged mother-in-law…
—Elon’s Reply to this Xpost
And here I grew up dreaming of jet packs and flying cars. My mind did not even comprehend taking a rocket to Vegas!
How does it land?
The tower will catch it, in the same way it already caught "Super Heavy Booster".
--Grok 2
I saw the tower catch the booster, we might be in for a rough landing.......LOL
And a rough ride, 3-4Gs in a rocket haha!
nah.... we'll jump in the "family truckster" and drive cross-country.... maybe stop in and see Cousin Eddie.....
As long as we can get frequent flyer miles…looks interesting, for sure.
I can't remember his name now....
Air Force Colonel or General??? Gave a talk about the urgency of the space race prior to Space Force coming online... I want to say circa 2015.
He said we'd be able to go to any point on earth in one hour and that the technology was already available now (2015) and... other stuff...
So I believe it is real, but NOT using rockets...
Holy Schmidt!