Texas at forefront of space exploration: NASA and SpaceX make breakthroughs

NORTH TEXAS — The last two days have been groundbreaking for space exploration, with two historic space missions, one of which launched from the Lone Star State.

On Monday morning, NASA launched a probe into space, marking the start of a five-and-a-half-year mission to Jupiter's moon Europa. The goal of the Europa Clipper mission is to determine if the moon's ocean contains life.

Texas also made history when SpaceX launched its Starship rocket from Boca Chica, Texas. This mission marked the first time a booster rocket successfully returned to its original launch location after a flight.

Ken Ruffin, president of the North Texas chapter of the National Space Society, has been educating the public on space exploration and science. He watched every moment of both the NASA and SpaceX missions and believes the recent successful SpaceX mission could lead to a future where anyone can buy a ticket to travel to the moon or Mars.

"These missions are going to force textbooks to be rewritten," Ruffin said. "[The moon and Mars] will be destinations that people can go to — not for billions or millions of dollars — but for the price of a first-class intercontinental flight. So, it's a revolution in the mindset of how people hopefully will eventually start to think about space travel. It's game-changing."

At Nolan Catholic High School in Fort Worth, science teacher Rick Garnett used the historic moment on Monday as a learning opportunity for his students.

"Until somebody walks on Mars, I think this is the moment for the decade. Seeing the technology working well and flawlessly — it's pretty astounding," Garnett told CBS News Texas. "And then that Europa Clipper mission is going to be amazing because it could actually totally rewrite biology books."

"The fact that this is all going on and Mr. Garnett showed it to us — it just lets me know that it's something in my lifetime that is achievable," said senior student Luke Laughlin.

With Nolan Catholic High School's high-tech engineering program, student Tony Jenkins aspires to be an aerospace engineer, possibly working for NASA. He said the SpaceX mission inspired him even more to pursue his dream.

"It was just amazing because that is an extremely heavy rocket and they're able to weave it like a needle and thread exactly where they want it to catch it," Jenkins said. "It's really cool to see the current state of what aerospace engineering is doing because now it set the bar higher for me."