Austin, Texas | SpaceX pulled off a feat of technical wizardry on Sunday, not only flying a 71-metre rocket booster back to its launch site but also catching it out of the air with two giant mechanical arms.

It all happened during the fifth test flight of the Starship rocket and was a huge step forward for the ambitions of SpaceX and its founder, Elon Musk, which include one day transporting people to Mars.