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Aerospace NowWhen Apollo’s Lunar Module landed in 1969, its single descent engine blew away top-layer dust. But Starship HLS is a massive 15-story spaceship. Firing heavy Raptor engines close to the ground would create violent plume-surface interactions, carving deep craters into the regolith and blasting the vehicle with razor-sharp rock debris. To solve this, Starship switches to high-mounted mid-body thrusters for the final 100 meters of descent, keeping the high-velocity exhaust safely away from the surface.The landing gear itself is engineered with wide footpads and crushable shock-absorbing cartridges that permanently deform on contact, soaking up impact energy and stabilizing the giant rocket even on sloped or loose lunar terrain. Because testing this on Earth is tricky, SpaceX uses specialized gravity-offset cranes and thermal-vacuum chambers to replicate the Moon’s 1/6th gravity and –173°C cold. Best of all, NASA and SpaceX will validate this entire landing sequence with an uncrewed lunar test flight first before any astronauts climb aboard.What do you think is more challenging: the precision rocket landing on the Moon or taking the 50-meter elevator down to the surface? Let’s chat in the comments! 👇#SpaceX #Starship #StarshipHLS #NASA #Artemis #MoonLanding #RocketEngineering #Spaceflight #TechNews #AerospaceNow