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Elon Musk's Grasshopper rocket makes its highest leap to date

Elon Musk's Grasshopper rocket makes its highest leap to date

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SpaceX lateral motion screengrab (Credit: SpaceX/YouTube)
SpaceX lateral motion screengrab (Credit: SpaceX/YouTube)

Elon Musk's quest to build a rocket that can be reused after delivering its cargo is getting closer to the atmosphere's upper reaches. A new video from SpaceX shows the Grasshopper rocket reaching its highest point to date: 744 meters. The test flight comes a month after Musk demonstrated the Grasshopper launching, flying 300 feet laterally, then returning to the launchpad and landing vertically. SpaceX has a long way to go before its reusable rockets are ready to deliver their cargo to the cosmos. But combined with the successful test flight of a more powerful Falcon 9 rocket last month, Musk has said "I think we now have all the pieces of the puzzle to bring the rocket back home."