Watch this epic SpaceX rocket booster blooper reel go boom
Witness the thrill of defeat with a SpaceX video highlighting the breathtaking rocket booster failures that came before success.
SpaceX has gotten so good at safely landing its Falcon 9 rocket boosters we now expect successful touchdowns from the company. It wasn't always like that. There were some spectacular failures along the way, and SpaceX founder Elon Musk isn't afraid to relive the lows in a fascinating blooper-reel video.
Musk promised the video at the end of August and delivered on Thursday. The reel is fittingly titled "How Not to Land an Orbital Rocket Booster."
Putting together SpaceX rocket landing blooper reel. We messed up a lot before it finally worked, but there's some epic explosion footage …
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) August 31, 2017
The video kicks off with John Sousa's "The Liberty Bell," better known as the theme to the classic comedy show "Monty Python's Flying Circus." We're treated to a sequence of explosions, shots of debris in the water and booster bits falling from the sky.
There's plenty of humor here as the subtitles cover all the causes of failures, from "sticky throttle valve" to "well, technically it did land ... just not in one piece." The more recent SpaceX triumphs have given Musk and his company room to laugh at earlier efforts that didn't pan out.
The video wraps up with footage of successful landings, so there's a happy ending to look forward to.