posted 10-13-2019 07:03 PM               

Space Cover 535: Commercial Navy Recovery Fleets

When collectors think of naval recoveries they usually think of the Project Mercury-Gemini-Apollo-Skylab-ASTP recoveries. A few may even think of the unmanned recovery capsule recoveries – like Mars SPED test. Now water recoveries are back and so are space covers with them.

SpaceX has the largest recovery fleet of all the commercial space companies, with ships on both coasts. The west coast has "NRC Quest" which has recovered the commercial resupply mission Dragon capsules in the Pacific Ocean. Initial tests to recover payload fairings were also attempted on the west coast by recovery ship "Mr Steven." The autonomous drone ship "Just Follow the Instructions" performed Falcon 9 booster recovery – placed in location by a variety of tug boats.

Recently "Mr Steven" was moved to the east coast and renamed "GO Ms. Tree." "Just Follow the Instructions" has also recently moved east and is in port at a Morgan City, Lousiana, shipyard for updates.

The SpaceX east coast fleet has multiple ships – GO Navigator and GO Searcher are Dragon capsule recovery ships — with special hoists on the stern to lift the casule out of the water, GO Ms. Tree and GO Ms. Chief are fairing recovery ships — catching the fairing that are floating to Earth by parasail in nets strung above the ships, GO Quest is the recovery fleet supply ship, and the Falcon 9 booster recovery drone ship is "Of Course I Still Love You."

Pictured above is a cover for a recovery rehearsal by NASA and SpaceX for the upcoming Crew Dragon flight. SpaceX is committed to recovering the astronauts within 45 minutes of splashdown. You can see a helicopter performing the evacuation rehearsal on GO Searcher's helipad in the cachet.

Above is a cover from the recovery of the payload fairing for the AMOS-17 launch by "GO Ms. Tree." You can see the net "GO Ms. Tree" uses for fairing recovery in the cachet picture. SpaceX has been recovering Falcon 9 boosters for quite some time on both coasts on the drone ships.

United Launch Alliance also has a navy – the "M/V Delta Mariner" transported the Atlas boosters from the Decatur, Alabama assembly plant to the cape for launches — covers exist for its arrival. The ship was just renamed as the "R/S RocketShip" by ULA — image from the renaming ceremony.

Blue Origin and RocketLab have announced that they too will be recovering boosters aboard ships. Above is a picture of the work being done on the Blue Origin ship to covert it for space recoveries. It is planned to move to Port Canaveral in 2020.

So if you are interested in space related naval recoveries exciting times are here — be on the lookout for covers for the ship activities such as training, departure and return from recoveries, and ship upgrades and sea trials.