[lmm]

To be clear it's a barge, not a dock.

It might be possible, but we're talking about a rocket descending from hypersonic spaceflight; the accuracy is always going to be +/- a few metres. And the rocket would still have to have some kind of "hardpoints" that were strong enough to absorb the landing impact (you don't want to land smack on the delicate engine nozzles). A (relatively) big flat landing field and legs on the rocket itself seem like the smart approach (and Musk wants whatever technology they use to be usable for landing on Mars too).

[ck2]

Yeah but if a rocket can so easily explode just by falling over, I'm not sure there are any legs I trust it to land on.

I mean what if the legs were damaged during launch somehow, how exactly would it get back down safely other than just dropping it in the ocean completely?

[zardo]

>I mean what if the legs were damaged during launch somehow, how exactly would it get back down safely other than just dropping it in the ocean completely?

Then it blows up and you fix the extremely serious problem that threatened the primary mission by damaging the rocket during launch.

[mikeash]

It's much better to focus on having the legs work than to come up with wacky workarounds. The legs are proven, don't forget. They need debugging, but they work.

Also remember that recovery is not a requirement. This rocket started out as a pure expendable launcher. It's profitable right now even throwing everything away. If you lose half the first stages while landing, you're still way ahead. And there's no reason to think the success rate will be nearly that low once they get some more experience with it.

[ceejayoz]

> I mean what if the legs were damaged during launch somehow, how exactly would it get back down safely other than just dropping it in the ocean completely?

That's exactly the plan. The first stage will never carry humans, so in the event of a major technical fault it'd just drop into the sea.

> Yeah but if a rocket can so easily explode just by falling over, I'm not sure there are any legs I trust it to land on.

Your proposal is a giant landing pad that snaps shut to hold the stage in place. I'd trust a leg over that...

[lmm]

There are any number of critical systems on a rocket - what if the fuel tanks were damaged during launch somehow? Or the grid fins? Or the hydraulic tanks? Or the engines?