I was at Canaveral for the double booster return (Heavy?), and it's unbelievable the velocity those things come back down at, with the powered deceleration.
A few seconds after the sonic boom, you're seeing them cancel out the last of their velocity and land on the pad.
One of those 'it can't possibly be that big because nothing that big could be moving that fast' optical lack of reference moments.
[−]somenameforme · 2026-11-15 Sun 02:21 UTC ·
link
Yeah I think people that have never seen one of the beasts just can't imagine the scale. Fully 'assembled, the height is upwards of 120m - 70 on the booster, 50 on the upper stage. So it's something bigger than a football/handegg field going into space and something still in the same ballpark coming down at near freefall, then slowing itself, and landing on a spot with a margin of error of a few meters.
A few seconds after the sonic boom, you're seeing them cancel out the last of their velocity and land on the pad.
One of those 'it can't possibly be that big because nothing that big could be moving that fast' optical lack of reference moments.