XINHUA - MAY 5, 2022
On Monday, a company called Rocket Lab used a plane to catch a rocket when it fell from space. Rocket Lab hopes to lower the costs of rocket launches by using the booster（推进器）of the rocket again.
To get enough energy to launch spaceship into space, a rocket may use more than one booster. Peter, who leads Rocket Lab, says that about 80% of the costs of a rocket is for the first booster. That's why Rocket Lab is working to try to catch and use its first part of the boosters again. Saving money by using rocket parts again will bring down the cost of launching.
In the past, Rocket Lab let some boosters fall into the ocean and took them back, but the salty sea water can be bad for boosters and make them hard to reuse safely.
As you might imagine, catching a big rocket booster is very difficult because it weighs nearly 1,000 kg, but it worked — at least for a short time. When it began falling, a parachute was opened to slow it down. Then, the plane used a long cable with a hook at the end to catch it. This hook caught onto another cable between the parachute and the booster, catching the falling booster. So, the quality of the cable is very important.
This test wasn't fully successful because later the plane had to drop off the rocket for safety reasons because the cable was not strong enough. However, Rocket Lab still hopes that next time the plane will be able to take the booster to a nearby boat.
