The SpaceX fairing recovery vessel Mr Steven makes its way into the Port of Los Angeles Wednesday May 23rd evening after recovering the fairing from the SpaceX Iridium 6/Grace FO launch Tuesday May 22, 2018. Photo By Charles Bennett 5/23/2018

The SpaceX fairing recovery vessel Mr Steven makes its way into the Port of Los Angeles Wednesday May 23rd evening after recovering the fairing from the SpaceX Iridium 6/Grace FO launch Tuesday May 22, 2018. Photo By Charles Bennett 5/23/2018

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The SpaceX fairing recovery vessel Mr Steven makes its way into the Port of Los Angeles Wednesday May 23rd evening after recovering the fairing from the SpaceX Iridium 6/Grace FO launch Tuesday May 22, 2018. Photo By Charles Bennett 5/23/2018

The SpaceX fairing recovery vessel Mr Steven makes its way into the Port of Los Angeles Wednesday May 23rd evening after recovering the fairing from the SpaceX Iridium 6/Grace FO launch Tuesday May 22, 2018. Photo By Charles Bennett 5/23/2018

The SpaceX fairing recovery vessel Mr Steven makes its way into the Port of Los Angeles Wednesday May 23rd evening after recovering the fairing from the SpaceX Iridium 6/Grace FO launch Tuesday May 22, 2018. Photo By Charles Bennett 5/23/2018



One day after splashing down in the Pacific Ocean, the nose cone of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket arrived aboard a recovery ship Wednesday evening in the Port of Los Angeles.

Two fairing halves were spotted entering the port on an experimental boat named Mr. Steven about 7 p.m., passing the Angels Gate Lighthouse and a cargo ship.

The claw-like vessel was deployed for Tuesday’s rideshare launch of two sets of satellites from Vandenberg Air Force Base, but didn’t catch the fairing, though it “came very close,” SpaceX confirmed during a webcast.

The fairing halves deployed GPS-guided parachutes before they landed in the ocean.

Mr. Steven wasn’t outfitted with the yellow net it had during the launch of five Iridium communications satellites and two climate-analyzing GRACE-FO satellites for NASA and German researchers.

Hawthorne-based SpaceX has mastered landing first-stage boosters when they return from orbit, and is experimenting with Mr. Steven to try and also recover the costly nose cone fairings that protect a rocket’s payload.

The private space company uses San Pedro’s Outer Harbor for its West Coast operations and recently secured a lease for a 19-acre site on Terminal Island to build a manufacturing plant for its future deep-space rocket, the BFR.