Reentry: SpaceX, Elon Musk, and the Reusable Rockets that Launched a Second Space Age

SpaceX #2

by Eric Berger

How did a shaky startup that barely got its first rocket off the ground defy expectations to become the world’s leading spaceflight company? 

Get the untold story of the team of game-changers, led by a well-known billionaire, who are sending NASA astronauts to space—and just might carry the human race to Mars.

In the 21st century, space travel has become a commercial venture. And one company dominates the modern space SpaceX, founded by controversial entrepreneur Elon Musk in 2002, and now sending more payloads into Earth orbit than the rest of the world combined. 

But Musk didn’t do it alone. The saga of SpaceX is the story of a diverse cadre of true believers in the limitless potential of space travel. For the first time, Reentry relates the definitive chronicle of how this daring team of risk-takers was able to redefine what it takes to reach the stars. 

With Pulitzer Prize-nominated journalist Eric Berger, author of Liftoff, as your guide, you’ll accompany SpaceX’s innovative thinkers during their toughest trials and most audacious moments,

Creating the first orbital rockets that can land by themselves and fly againTransporting a 120-ft rocket from Texas to Florida by truck via back roads Fixing a cracked engine nozzle using hand tools, just days before liftoff Sending a wheel of cheese into orbitSearching the ocean for the first rocket that splashed down intactBeing in the room where it happened—when SpaceX nearly lost big to BoeingIdentifying the $4 part that led to a rocket exploding in flightModifying a Tesla to prevent implosion in space
From launchpad explosions to a pernicious cricket infestation to the harsh management style of Musk himself, the rise of SpaceX was beset with challenges and far from inevitable. Find out how a start-up that no one thought could get off the ground flew high enough to outpace their rivals . . . and where they’re going next.

Genres: Nonfiction, Space, Science, Business, Technology, History, Engineering

384 pages, Kindle Edition

First published September 24, 2024

About the author

Eric Berger is the senior space editor at Ars Technica, covering everything from new space to NASA policy. Eric has an astronomy degree from the University of Texas and a master's in journalism from the University of Missouri. He previously worked at the Houston Chronicle for 17 years, where the paper was a Pulitzer Prize finalist in 2009 for his coverage of Hurricane Ike. A certified meteorologist, Eric founded Space City Weather and lives in Houston.

Reviews

[Awais Ahmed · Rating 5 out of 5]

A detailed dive into the engineering grit and sheer willpower that fueled SpaceX’s rise. Vividly captures the raw intensity of Elon Musk but more importantly his scrappy team as they battled failure after failure, pushing their ingenuity to the limits. The book makes you feel how every launch felt like life or death, and how every success was hard-won. A gripping narrative of how relentless perseverance and daring engineering rewrote the future of space travel. I also liked the fact that alongside Elon's contributions, Eric also focuses quite a bit on the efforts of the engineers on ground itself that made it happen.

[Pete · Rating 5 out of 5]

Reentry : SpaceX, Elon Musk and the Reusable Rockets that Launched a Second Space Age (2024) by Eric Berger is a marvelous book about SpaceX. Berger is a longtime writer for Ars Technica, a website that has long had in depth articles on technical subjects. Reentry is a follow up to Liftoff, his first book about SpaceX.

Reentry is about SpaceX from 2008 onward. Berger has been covering SpaceX for many years and has fantastic access to the people involved, including Musk. Berger has a background in Astronomy. He demonstrates a real understanding of many of the technical issues that SpaceX has faced. He also explains them very well.

The book also conveys just how hard the people at SpaceX have worked. It is clearly not a company that does work life balance. The book mentions divorces. There are many people who leave after a years. Berger also writes about how this is viable for SpaceX. This is because it’s working on something that is so hard and yet so important. There are also people who come back because they miss the mission. Berger contrasts this to working at Twitter where delivering short messages just isn’t as important.

Reentry covers the period when SpaceX started to get launch contracts from 2008. There is a lot of detail on how they worked incredibly hard to improve their rockets as well. This reaches a crescendo when they manage to land a rocket again and are able to re-use rockets.

There are many engineers and characters involved, they become a bit hard to remember. However, Berger does a really good job in showing how people came in from various backgrounds to work for SpaceX. Some were from games companies, some from working at Sea world and other places.

Reentry does a really good job of conveying the tension involved with SpaceX. Various launches and important milestones had to be reached. The company could really have failed.

It is really interesting to read about how serious Musk is about getting to Mars. This has quite an impact and drives the company as well.

The book does a good job of conveying how SpaceX operates. People work really, really hard and solve problems fast. They repeatedly manage to do things much more cheaply than other companies. Musk drives the company and really pushes people to work super hard and solve their problems. It also clearly burns people out. For most normal companies this would be a disaster but it works for SpaceX.

The stories of the failures and the SpaceX investigations are also really interesting. When SpaceX has lost rockets they have quickly managed to find the faults and fix them.

The book illustrates what very smart, hard working people can achieve. Hopefully in a decade or so something similar will be written about Commonwealth Fusion or another similar company. Hopefully the books on SpaceX also continue and there is a third book about SpaceX getting to the moon.

Reentry is an excellent book for anyone interested in space flight and how SpaceX has managed to cut the cost of putting objects in orbit by so much. Berger knows his subject really well, had really good access and writes well.

[Brian Wilson]

This is a fantastic book, but one sort of for those already in-the-know.

If you already understand that going to space is more about going sideways than it is about going up, this book is for you.

If you already know what a composite over wrapped pressure vessel is, this book is for you.

If you love the whole space industry, this is for you.

If you can’t wait for the next Scott Manley video, this is for you.

If you can’t wait for the next Everyday Astronaut video by Tim Dodd, this is for you.

If you can’t wait for each Saturday when there are new updates from Marcus House, this is for you.

If you can remember where you were and what you were doing when certain early Falcon 9s failed, launched, or landed, this book is for you.

This book is full of insider details. Where did Kathy Leuders sleep during a particularly nerve racking Falcon 9 launch? Who was the driver behind the upgraded parachutes that get the likes of NASA astronauts and Jared Isaacman back from orbit?

Yet it left me wanting more. How did SpaceX program the algorithms that determine when its returning rockets decide to puff out their limited nitrogen cold gas thrusters as they descend from the heavens toward the cold unyielding surfaces of ground or barge landing pads?

I don’t know.

And I want to.

But this book tells the great stories of some of the engineers who pushed SpaceX and by proxy humanity forward into the age of reusable rockets and launch vehicles.

I can’t wait for its sequel about Starship.

Excellent reading.

[Chad · Rating 5 out of 5]

I enjoyed this book very much, I thought it was well-written and engaging throughout. The nonlinear storytelling was a bit hard to follow at times, but I understand why it was necessary. There's just a lot of content that overlaps across a variety of programs. The anecdotes are interesting, and Berger clearly has extremely high-level access to the key players. 


Working at a company mentioned in the book that isn't SpaceX, I didn't leave with the best feeling. SpaceX has accomplished things other companies wish they could, though it comes at a personal cost to many employees. However, I had some takeaways on why SpaceX has continued to be so successful. 


Firstly, Musk is a dictator who understands the financial and (at least high-level) technical aspects of the company. He has the final say, and decisions can be routed through him rather than committees and middle-management. This is repeatedly showcased in the book and allows rapid decision making. Similarly, Musk singlehandedly owns the vision of the company. This seems to have helped in two respects: it keeps every employee focused on the end mission, and Musk can rapidly decide a capacity is (or isn't) needed based on how it fits his vision. There is a knock-on effect in that SpaceX attracts enthusiastic engineers willing to put in 60, 80, or 100 hour weeks in pursuit of that vision. Employee ownership via stock options is certainly also a driver of this enthusiasm. All of that stems from Musk, although at this point it's become self-perpetuating to some extent via the culture he instilled.


On the same token, most of the problems of the company seem to also stem from Musk. The most obvious example is his direct or indirect mistreatment of employees. Several direct examples are given: calls in the middle of the night or blame received for issues. Indirectly, the expectation of each employee to put in incredible work weeks originates with Musk. It's also briefly mentioned that the culture is toxic, especially for women. The book glosses over this in a few paragraphs, but I think it's more of a systemic issue (based on my own experiences of the SpaceX "bro culture"). It's remarkable that employees have to cope with this by accepting that, sooner or later, they will get tangled up in something Musk disagrees with and get unceremoniously fired.


Throughout the book I had to question whether Berger's personal opinions and professional relationships/access with SpaceX employees colored his reporting. At times, I think it did. Not the least of which is in how some competitors are protrayed which while valid criticism was also one-sided. However, on balance I think it was overall fair and criticized Musk's antics while celebrating the engineers under him and their achievements. This is most plain in the starting and ending chapters but is implied throughout. And I agree with the conclusion: SpaceX's success is tied to Musk; should he continue down an increasingly politicized path the goodwill SpaceX (rightly) has may decline. And without Musk (or Shotwell reigning him in) it's unclear if SpaceX can continue it's momentum.

[Will Austin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great follow up to Liftoff but didn't feel as "in the trenches" as I had hoped.
I would have preferred that the book solely focus on the first few Falcon 9 launches, in the same way Liftoff covers the Falcon 1 launches, instead of the entire period from 2008 to 2023. Feels slightly more polished (or the gritty, accurate details omitted), but I am not really complaining that much.

Some notes:
Lots from Zach Dunn again but surprisingly little from Tom Mueller.
Hans Koenigsmann MVP.
Feel bad for Tim Buzza and Bulent Altan.
Very cool to see Robb Kulin appear a few times.
Never had heard of Mark Juncosa before so his description in the book lines up.
Dmitry Rogozin going from Head of Roscosmos to being injured in occupied Ukraine within one page was not something I expected.
Glad to see it took 300 or so pages before Trump gets mentioned, and when he does, he's acting like a dickhead.
Great epilogue from Eric regarding his worries for the future of SpaceX and valid concerns, that seem obvious thinking about it out loud.
Great book and lives up to the wait. Curious to see what Eric follows up with next.

Favourite bit:
Doug Hurley first appearing in the book as the only astronaut of six to successfully dock with space station on the first attempt in the simulator during testing of the Dragon capsule touch screen user interface, to state "Frankly, Dragon flew like shit," to actually being in the hot seat for the Crew Dragon Demo-2 mission and the mission being a massive success.

[Vance Christiaanse · Rating 5 out of 5]

Some books stand out because the information they convey is so important. Others stand out because they are so well written. This book stands out for both reasons. The story of SpaceX may be one of the most important stories in human history--especially if they succeed in getting humans to Mars. And this book tells that story in a way that won't let you stop reading.

The book is really a continuation of the author's earlier book, Liftoff. I haven't read Liftoff but I did read Ashley Vance's book on the early years of SpaceX and that prepared me adequately. It might be helpful to have read something about SpaceX and the Falcon 1 before picking up this book.

Be aware: this story has so many threads that it can't be told chronologically. So be prepared to jump backward and forward many years at a time from one chapter to the next.

[Richard van Haag · Rating 5 out of 5]

Simply incredible. While reading the book it feels like you’re actually taken to the events that shaped SpaceX as you experience them from the perspectives of the people that turned science-fiction into a reality. While I’ve been a fan of spaceflight and SpaceX for years, this book truly made me realise and respect the sacrifices and effort put in by so many people to make it all happen.

[Jason Lin · Rating 5 out of 5]

Bingeable and neatly episodic. Berger is fantastic with his technical explanations while not being pedantic. He also unhesitatingly shares his personal opinions (eg regarding Musk’s distractions) for a balanced, nuanced view grounded in his decades of experience as a veteran space reporter.

[Jelmar Vermeulen · Rating 4 out of 5]

SpaceX is cray

[Ravioli · Rating 3 out of 5]

Writing a book about Musk in this day and age requires walking a very thin tightrope. When someone has outed themselves to be a terrible person, it is much easier to pretend that they've never done anything of value in their lives--just look at how most people on the internet will now insist that the Harry Potter books were trash all along, actually. Unfortunately, people contain multitudes, and while it has become popular to say that Elon's only contribution to SpaceX is that he threw money at the right people, I think without his dedication to frugality, his unorthodox and hands-on leadership style, his focus on the big picture, and his unwavering dream to settle Mars, SpaceX would never have gotten even a Falcon 1 airborne, let alone become the industry giant it is today. An accurate retelling of SpaceX will have to give Elon the credit he deserves.

That being said, it is a bit hard to stomach all of the Musk praise in this book, and while people accusing Berger of being a "Musk shill" may be going a step too far, it's not hard to see how they're coming to that conclusion. Backing up a bit: Berger is the senior space editor at Ars Technica, and I have read his articles on the space industry (and the weekly rocket reports!) for years. His reporting, while factual and well-written, has an obvious pro-SpaceX, and even pro-Musk, bias. Does this show up in the book? Well...yes.

First, I want to be fair. Getting Elon's viewpoint on anything is way easier than getting the views of his employees. Elon is only one person, and a fairly accessible one, and for better and for worse, he's always happy to tell you exactly what he thinks of something. And yet Berger interviewed many, many SpaceX employees for this book, and quite extensively. I believe that he did his best to make this book as balanced as possible, and that he had a genuine, empathetic interest in telling the stories of SpaceX employees. And, he includes plenty of stories of employees burning out, or getting hurt, or becoming disillusioned from the company, often due to Musk's direct actions. He interviewed a flight director, Brian Mosdell, who quit in part because he couldn't bear to push his employees as hard as Musk was demanding him to: "I don't know what they think, but eighty hours a week is just completely unreasonable, let alone a hundred hours a week...I think the management strategy was to drive people into the ground, because you can replace them later, and you'll get the biggest bang for your buck."

That's a pretty damning criticism of SpaceX's company culture, and it's far from the only story like it in this book. So where is the bias? Well...it's sort of everywhere, and I think that's because it stems from a core belief of Berger's, one that I fundamentally disagree with.

Examples of bias first, then speculation as to where it comes from.

1) Incidents that could put Musk into a bad light (worse than "demanding boss"), such as Black Sunday, or an engineer losing a foot while trying to board the drone ship (!!) are described in almost laughable brevity. You can almost hear Berger saying "anyways...moving on"

2) Elon is frequently described as a genius. I can believe that making a company like SpaceX successful requires some serious business chops, but it's hard to see him described as an "engineer" and "brilliant" when, not even two pages later, he's questioning if we really need rebar to build a concrete flight facility, or is completely convinced that the AMOS-6 rocket blew up because ULA hired a sniper to shoot it. To be clear: while Musk has an engineering degree, I am not expecting him to have the same depth of knowledge as his employees. However, a lot of the Musk-employee communication in the book went like this: Musk would ask his people to do something impossible by, like, next week. They would say, "well that's kind of crazy, because of xyz." Musk would then say, "I don't care, just get it done." His brilliant employees would get it done in two weeks because they worked 80-100 hours a week, 7 days a week, and slept on the factory floor. It got done because of the tenacity, dedication, and skill of his employees, not because him telling them to "just figure it out" is some sort of 4D chess move.

3) Honest, sympathetic discussions of company culture, while common, are frequently followed by anecdotes of people who just love working there. Or, even more suspect, by discussion of how most young aerospace people want to work for SpaceX. As if outside perception of SpaceX has the same credibility as the lived experiences of its employees! And, concerningly, Berger both waves off the experiences of employees and frames post-grad interest as a credible measure of SpaceX's coolness by saying that people who join SpaceX know what they're getting into. No, they don't. Nobody knows what working 7 days a week for 80-100 hours a week for 6 months is like until they actually do it. Story time: a friend of my friend actually worked for SpaceX. A passionate, brilliant, recent aerospace grad who went of to SpaceX for two years...and came back a bit of a shell of himself. There's frequent anecdotes of SpaceX burning out its employees, but there's little discussion about what that means. Being burned out doesn't mean that you quit, catch up on sleep, and then go work for Boeing. Being burned out means months or years of mental and/or physical recovery, and potentially a complete loss of interest in what had once been the most important thing in someone's life.

And so here's when I start thinking about Berger's viewpoint. Elon pushes his employees to, and often far past the breaking point--making them work 80-100 hours a week for months on end with no days off, screaming at them for delays beyond their control, forcing them to choose between having a family and working for him--and Berger never asks if...this is worth it. Rather, it's treated as an unfortunate necessity--such is just the cost of greatness.

If he believes this to be true, his admiration of Musk makes more sense. It turns Musk from a heartless, stupid, and frequently delusional employer constantly saved by the brilliance and back-breaking work of his employees into a clear-headed visionary, who is the only one brave enough to do what must be done. Unlike, say, NASA, with their small-minded goals (how dare they only want to "explore" space and not "settle" it!) and ego-stroking ticker-tape parades--yes, these are both real things he says. While NASA's far from perfect, the depth of his contempt for them is a bit baffling.

And while in hindsight SpaceX's rapid ascent happened just in the nick of time (considering the Ukraine war, the shutdown of the shuttle program, the failures of Ariane 6, etc), it's important to remember that these were happy accidents--Musk is pushing his employees this hard for one reason and one reason only: to settle Mars. Despite this being the whole reason for the company's existence, Berger spends very little time explaining why Elon thinks we should settle Mars, let alone why it must happen so soon. Whether that's because he thinks it's obvious or because he thinks it's beyond the scope of the book is unclear, but the end result is the same--that I don't believe in Elon's cause enough to excuse the way SpaceX operates.

And so this is where I diverge from him. I do not think it has to be this way. And I don't think it's worth it. And it angers me that Berger (and others) have decided that because SpaceX has been successful, the way it conducts itself is within the range of tolerance, or even that it's the ideal business model.

Still, this book was fascinating, earnest, well-researched, and fairly well written, and I'm glad I read it. I just won't be able to recommend it to people without some serious disclaimers, and I suspect the "Elon genius" will continue to age like LOX that's been left in the rocket tank for too long.

[Mbogo J · Rating 3 out of 5]

It appeared to be a special effect sequence in a movie, this gigantic rocket booster firing its engines and guiding itself back to an arresting arm, ignoring the fact that it had boosted a payload to space, this in itself would have been impressive...In the age of generative AI, I have developed a habit to distrust anything like this until sufficient evidence has shown it to be real, like everyone I was very impressed and rather than credit Elon I was interested in the unnamed engineers who made this possible, the problems they grappled with, how they solved them and what they felt seeing their sucess. This was the main reason why I read this book...I did not find what I was looking for.

The book is a scattered history of SpaceX, some names of the people involved and lots of anecdotes about Elon. There was little bang by bang on how the team went about to building something, technical challenges encountered or the mechanics of how some things operated. The drama of launch was recreated over and over when other technical issues should have been reviewed. The author was also a little too close to the subject matter and at times the book read like a propaganda piece, I would have hazard someone like Robert Caro would have written a far different take from this. A lot of issues were glossed over and Elon's poor management style shooed away. Setting unrealistic targets is not leadership but rather a luxury afforded when you have a lot of money...

I belong to the school of thought that does not praise one person for the efforts of many, I never joined in the cult that endlessly praised Steve Jobs but rather the other one that was impressed by the researchers at Xerox PARC labs who made all these things possible they just happened to be poor marketters. Similar to the success of at Spacex, I still remain on the lookout for the story that tells the engineer's side of the story. This book was not it.

[Marieke Desmond · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read and thoroughly enjoyed Eric Berger's first book outlining how SpaceX got a rocket into space. This follow up book is somehow even more intense and awe inspiring as it chronicles SpaceX's drive to make reusable boosters and rockets and launch bigger and bigger payloads into space.

The shift in thinking that SpaceX's accomplishments represent is really incredible. Starting in 2016, SpaceX matched or exceeded the conventional space industry's record of total launches. Then SpaceX started outstripping the competition. In 2021, the industry giant launched five rockets. In one month alone, SpaceX launched five rockets.

And then factor in reusability. Suddenly the idea of affordable space travel wasn't preposterous.

One SpaceX booster would fly 11 missions. "A single Falcon 9 Booster, therefore, matched the performance of 11 expendable Atlas rockets. 11 Russian rocket engines lay on the bottom of the ocean. But at the surface, nine American engines stood atop a barge ready to fly again."

I wish I understood all the chemistry of rocket science but somehow I still enjoyed reading about liquid oxygen, testing different chemical propellants, and the wild goose chase of trying to diagnose failures that blew up spectacularly on launch pads and in tests along the way.

If you liked Liftoff, there are lots of similarities in both books; the single focus almost manic intensity Elon embodied in his quest to make space travel affordable, and to one day, reach Mars, the work hours and moving goal posts associated with that, and all the politics and hassle associated with navigating government agencies and contracts.

It's also still hard to follow Berger's non-linear chapters, but all in all, he has done it again, a fascinating, personality driven look at what it took to launch this second Space Age.

[Jamie Barringer (Ravenmount) · Rating 5 out of 5]

I know I am not alone in being hesitant to read an arc that is at least in part about Elon Musk. I liked Twitter, and have really strongly disliked some of what Musk has said and supported over the past few years. It has almost been enough drama, mostly negative, to make me forget that Musk was also the person who started and has been running SpaceX. Thanks to this company, the science fiction I grew up reading may really be happening in my lifetime. And, since Musk was so distracted with all his non-space oriented drama, this book turns out to be mostly about SpaceX, while also acknowledging Musk's issues and limitations. I watched several of the more pivotal launches on livestreams, .so it was great reading the story of how these moments in modern science and technology happened. I do wonder if Musk can rein himself back in enough to actually stay focused on Mars, but if he can, or if someone younger and more focused can pick up where he leaves off, we may even see a Moon or Mars colony while I am still alive to see it.

[George Johnson · Rating 5 out of 5]

The follow up to Berger's Liftoff, that followed SpaceX from its founding to the succesful last flight of Falcon 1, Reentry follows the Falcon 9 program, the introduction of landing and reuse of its first stage, Falcon Heavy's development, the Dragon Cargo and Crew Dragon, Starship, Starlink that has made SpaceX into a juggernaut today that is frankly eating the lunch of all its competitors. To be honest, these things make it much more interesting to me than Liftoff, however, the sheer amount of material it covers means it has less detail for every topic.

A must read for understanding where new space is headed, and why legacy aerospace is unlikely to catch up anytime soon (if ever).

[Simen N. Myklebust · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read a preview from the publisher and this is an excellent read in the same vein as Berger’s first book. Berger writes really well and makes the book hard to put down. I was most struck by the way NASA employees time and again opens the door for SpaceX to change the industry even at personal risk. The old industry giants however do not come off very well in this book, and when I read it the Boeing Starliner was still stuck at the space station.

[Dan Morris · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5

[Michael · Rating 5 out of 5]

Dog ain’t scared

[Tiago Flora · Rating 4 out of 5]

Watching a 4K recording of a Starship landing (or better yet, the live video from onboard the rocket) can be quite an emotional experience. Imagine if you read the countdown for such a launch. Or designed its avionics. Or spent months away from home in some hole spending hours at a time doing manual adjustments to fiddly test systems. "Emotional" would give way to ecstasy.

The lengths people go when working toward a mission under the axe are impressive. And it turns out you can go much further per $ by having a credible shot at achieving the extraordinary.

Eric Berger did a great job covering the maturation of SpaceX into the dominant space company it is today. It's a solid account of the years after the Falcon 1, from the development of the Falcon 9 to the Dragon capsule, Falcon Heavy, Starlink, and Starship. It's clear that Berger cares about the new space age, and wants to endorse the spirit that made SpaceX what it is.

Controversies aside, the company has achieved what countries couldn't. It is by now the largest space program on Earth, with no close second. This book very entertainingly goes through some of the stories that demonstrate what it takes to get to this position.

[Jeff Brawner · Rating 4 out of 5]

I think to understand Elon Musk and his recent actions at both Twitter and government agencies, it is helpful to see how he runs his company. There are sections of this book that are fascinating, and regardless of what one thinks about musk politically you cannot deny that he has changed the world. The fact that he was able to make the technical achievements as well as the cost cutting measures to change space exploration brings to mind both genius and ruthlessness. After all, when someone brings the cost of putting large satellites into space down by 90%, he is doing something right.

At times, the technical part of the book would prove to be too much for people that are not detail or scientifically minded. At times, I certainly felt bogged down. Still, this book proved to be one of the best. I’ve listened to this year.

[Ransom · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fascinating and informative read. I had no idea the extent of SpaceX's disruption and innovation in the industry. Without knowing very much myself, I feel like Berger does a good job of balancing the strengths and weaknesses, successes and failures of company and the people involved. Came away thrilled and excited about the future of American space exploration.

I won this as a Goodreads Giveaway.

[Darnell · Rating 4 out of 5]

Perfectly serviceable treatment of the topic. I was familiar with most of the technological subjects, but hearing about SpaceX in the news sometimes did not give me a clear view of its development at all.

[Scripps Wilkinson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good easy quick read on SpaceX’s path to reusable rockets. Entertaining vignettes and highlights how intense the culture is at SpaceX.

[Erik]

Annoyingly nonlinear

[Yura Gavrilovich · Rating 4 out of 5]

Similar to the first book - a lot of stories about SpaceX's achievements and it's brilliant employees. This one provides interesting details regarding competition with ULA and Boeing and cooperation with NASA.

[Jayden Litolff · Rating 5 out of 5]

Loved the behind the scenes, and the ridiculous stories.

"Duderino, we're going to rock your world" is the funniest quote in the book imo

Make sure you have your Johnny Cash, Green Day and Metallica ready if you like music while you read

Although I understand all the jumping back and forth in time for chapters was probably nessecary it did still feel a little bit disorienting

[Brian Miracle · Rating 5 out of 5]

Eric Berger’s first book, “Liftoff”, covered SpaceX from its founding to its first successful launch into orbit in 2008. This second book covers the time from 2008 to 2023, when Spacex revolutionized and came to dominate the space industry. With many personal accounts from current and former SpaceXers, as well as other industry and government personnel, the book covers SpaceX’s successes and failures, including their relentless drive to press forward with Elon Musk’s vision for the company. The book shows how Musk is always pushing for the next thing, whether it be the Falcon 9, SpaceX’s first commercially viable rocket, landing and reusing rockets, the heavy lift Falcon Heavy rocket, the Crew Dragon that supplies the ISS, or Starship, which may take humans to the moon and Mars.

The author concludes with reasons why SpaceX has achieved its success, as well as potential pitfalls that could result in it losing its place in the industry.

Some examples of the approach that resulted in SpaceX’s success:

1. During the debut Dragon flight, a crack on the Falcon 9 second stage nozzle was discovered. This could cause the nozzle to tear itself apart. The obvious solution was to replace the nozzle, a delay of a month. Instead, since full second stage performance wasn’t needed for this demo flight, the team came up with a unique solution. A technician was raised to the level of the second stage with a crane. He then trimmed the entire nozzle back to beyond crack formation, using tin snips. He finished this job in 4 hours, allowing the launch to proceed.

2. During Dragon’s initial docking attempt with the ISS, the capsule lost LIDAR tracking at a range of 200 feet from the station. SpaceX diagnosed the problem and convinced NASA to allow them to patch the flight software and proceed with the mission, with the capsule less than a football field from the ISS. Because of the trust built up with NASA, SpaceX was allowed to patch the software and the mission was successful.

This is an interesting account of the company that has revolutionized commercial space flight.

[Tonya Woodbury · Rating 4 out of 5]

Everyone in the aerospace industry agrees that SpaceX has revolutionized the launch industry, and in this book Berger explains how they did so. SpaceX developed the most reliable and frequently launched rocket ever for the lowest cost ever by reusing the first stage of their Falcon 9 rocket, bringing in-house much of their supply chain, and constantly driving for cheaper engineering fixes to their problems. This drive was spearheaded by the private company’s CEO, Elon Musk. Musk constantly demands that his team work faster and cheaper, and while they never meet his ridiculous goals, they accomplish amazing things just by trying. Berger makes the case that SpaceX wouldn’t be able to maintain this culture and focus without Musk who has always been willing to take big risks and own the consequences when they do and don’t pay off. He worries that Musk’s acquisition of Twitter and increasingly erratic political moves could negatively affect SpaceX. While Musk’s demands have led to the Falcon 9’s amazing affordability and reliability, they also burn people out throughout the organization. SpaceX goes through a lot of young engineers who are willing to work 100 hour weeks to do amazing things, but find that that pace isn’t sustainable in the long run and then end up moving on. There’s a price to success, I guess. I know one thing for sure though, I never want to work for Musk, but I admire and appreciate the SpaceX team and the incredible things they’ve accomplished. Who knows, maybe in five years Berger will write another book about the development of SpaceX’s fully reusable Starship vehicle that Musk promises will revolutionize the space industry again and be humanity’s ride to Mars. The cynic in me is skeptical, but so far SpaceX has delivered on every promise it’s made, so I wouldn’t bet against them.

[Ryan · Rating 4 out of 5]

I love SpaceX and read all I can about this -- this isn't the best book on the topic (Ashlee Vance's book about Elon remains the best, and Liftoff, Berger's first book about SpaceX early days which was even beter than this one; When the Heavens Went on Sale was good too on SpaceX competitors), but good. This was focused on the past few years of SpaceX: Falcon 9/Heavy, the reusable rocket efforts (landing on barges), tangential information about Starlink, setting up at NASA in Florida, and the beginnings of Starship.

Doesn't go into real technical depth (it is a mass market book), maybe a little more focused on people (but again, not much detail), but it's a good factual account of what happened, with somewhat more information than otherwise available from public sources.

Main takeaway is just how high-pressure an environment SpaceX is, and how people work around Elon's hectoring (taking turns being the late person when everyone is late, answering with clear technical information, and having Elon assume responsibility for certain kinds of risky decisions which he seems happy to do.). Pretty amazing how helpful various military and NASA people were over the years -- in spite of bureaucratic incentives, they genuinely love space, science, and exploration, and were willing to take risks.

Looking forward to more books about Starship and future SpaceX missions.

[Phil Brown · Rating 3 out of 5]

A bait and switch in classic form. The first and last chapters hint that something may be rotten with Musk’s (effective, fast paced) leadership while the middle 95% of the book proceeds to dance around anything negative anyone may have said about him.

While interesting insight behind the scenes, the amazing accomplishments of SpaceX engineers are overshadowed by this book being just a compilation of anecdotes. Very little analysis of what makes them successful as a company or how they manage risk under pressure. More Elon hagiography from Berger, he knows where his bread is buttered.

[Fanchen Bao · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this book to learn the behind-the-scene stories of SpaceX and understand Musk's role in SpaceX's success. For these purposes, I am not disappointed. In fact, I am even pleasantly surprised by the epilogue where the author offered his sincere concern about a potential down fall of SpaceX due to Musk's shenanigans. The mind-boggling success of CATCHING Starship's super heavy booster in Oct 2024 showed that, at least temporarily, SpaceX has not lost the trailblazing spirit yet. However, how much longer can it keep pushing like a maniac towards the loft goal of interplanetary humanity, especially when its main man is now batshit crazy?

The work-life balance in SpaceX is non-existent; engineers are worked harder than farm animals. For a normal company, this is not sustainable as engineers would quit and the bad rep would make fresh recruitment impossible. Yet, the people willing to work for SpaceX were true believers. It was not "work" that they were doing, it was a noble sacrifice for a future they believed in. Come to think of it, the line between a SpaceXer working 100 hours per week for months on end and a religious zealot is strikingly blurred. Interplanetary humanity is their religion, SpaceX their temple of worship, and Musk their Messiah.

While it was the engineers who made all the technological leapfrogs in SpaceX and actually built the rockets, I have to admit that Musk is the real reason why any of these achievements were possible in the first place. Without his relentless and unreasonable pushing, the engineers would never have even attempted the seemingly impossible tasks. And if they hadn't attempted it, none of the innovation would have been possible. Even Musk's clearly ridiculous timelines served their purposes, albeit with a very high price tag, as they helped realize the real boundary of engineering (e.g., landing Dragon with propulsion system). Without Musk and his craziness, the space industry would still be doing their things the old way. Why would Boeing and the Russians land a rocket and reduce the launch cost 10x when they are already so comfortable with the fat government contracts? SpaceX, with a laser-focused Musk, is the best that competition and capitalism can bring to the table.

I have my utmost respect to all those who have worked or are still working in SpaceX. I myself am very certain that I would not survive such a harsh work environment, because deep down, I am pessimistic about humanity becoming interplanetary.

Memorable quotes

But this decision was not based solely on physics. Rather, it was due to politics and rivalries between the agency's field centers. Marshall Space Flight Center, in Alabama, already had its bread and butter with existing propulsion technology. And NASA management had little appetite for the exploding test articles that would necessarily accompany densification development. Neither of these were barriers at SpaceX, which could afford to fail.

p 198 (Internal politics are the killer of innovation. Having a strong man dictate priorities eliminates any political struggle and makes it possible for the whole company to bulldozer forward. There is definitely pros and cons with a strong man approach, but in this particular scenario, strong man is indeed a better choice.

The reason why Musk's style works at SpaceX, but not X, is simple. The 10,000 people who chose to work at SpaceX knew what they were getting into. Musk is a known quantity in the space industry. Prospective employees speak with friends about the work environment. Most importantly, they believe in the mission. Like, they really believe. And their vision aligns with Musk's sweeping and passionate goals for spaceflight....Not everyone felt so fervently, but most SpaceX employees were true believers. By contrast, many Twitter employees had never signed up to work for Musk and were appalled by their new boss's vision for their social network and his determination to rapidly bring it about.

p 260

"We tortured SpaceX for more than three years before we finally approved load-and-go...We could easily have said no, There was a lot of pressure on us to say no and do things like we always had done sine Apollo. Any other company would have given in. But this was critical tot he reusability of Falcon 9, and it's a testament to Elon's single-minded vision."...So committed was Musk that he willingly took on not just NASA but the entire human spaceflight community...."Without him, there is no reusability revolution".

p 288 (Before Musk took off his mask and embraced madness, he was truly a force to be reckoned with)