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SpaceX has successfully completed the second soft-landing in the ocean of its reusable rocket system with a view to landing it on solid ground - possibly by the end of the year.

The rocket was the first stage of a Falcon 9 that launched on 14 July, which took six Orbcomm satellites into orbit.

An on-board camera captured the descent, and the data gathered during the trip by SpaceX will improve the landing on upcoming flights.

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California-based SpaceX has released a video (screenshot shown) of its second successful rocket touchdown. The test is an important stepping stone to landing rockets on the ground. On this occasion the Falcon 9 rocket had a 'soft' landing in the Atlantic Ocean

The first stage of the rocket, which is the bottom part of it, separated about two minutes and 43 seconds after the launch on 14 July.

At this point the rocket was about over 31 miles (50km) high.

Just under six minutes later it then began to start the process of re-entry.

This started with what is known as a boost back burn, which took it on a parabola towards its target landing in the ocean.

It then ignited its engines again, having shut them off, to reduce its speed as it passed through the atmosphere.

This limits the amount of heat the rocket experiences from the atmosphere.

Once through the atmosphere, the rocket again underwent an unpowered descent before it ignited the engines once more above the ocean.

Here the landing legs deployed, which will one day be used to set the rocket down on the ground, and it touched down in the ocean.

As planned, the rocket then fell over horizontally, and the impact with the water destroyed the hull.

The video itself is not very clear because ice covered the camera as the rocket passed down through the atmosphere.

However SpaceX has acknolwedged this and said they are taking measures to limit the build up of ice and spots on the camera so that future videos are better quality.

Later this year SpaceX plans to attempt to land one of its Falcon 9 rockets on a floating barge. The ultimate goal is to build reusable rockets that can return from space. Pictured is the Grasshopper test rocket, which SpaceX has been using to perform 'hops' up to low altitudes and practice landing on solid ground

'This test confirms that the Falcon 9 booster is able consistently to re-enter from space at hypersonic velocity, restart main engines twice, deploy landing legs and touch down at near zero velocity,' SpaceX said in a news release.

Its ultimate goal, as mentioned earlier, is to make the rockets reusable and have them touch down on land.

And from their news release, it seems like their first attempt at doing this will be on a floating barge.

Amazon's Jeff Bezos holds a patent for landing rockets on barges, though, so it is not known if he will challenge Elon Musk over this.

'At this point, we are highly confident of being able to land successfully on a floating launch pad or back at the launch site and refly the rocket with no required refurbishment,' the company says.

This launch vehicle was a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket, carrying a payload of Orbcomm communications satellites, which lifted off from launch complex 40 at the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Cape Canaveral, Florida on Monday 14 July (pictured)

SpaceX CEO Elon Musk has grand plans for his space agency. With help from Nasa he has grown the company significantly in a decade. It is now capable of taking cargo to the ISS with its Dragon capsule and Falcon 9 rocket and, beginning possibly in the next few years, the company will take humans into space

They also reveal how the next water landing will be on flight 13 of the Falcon 9 series of rocket, which will take place in September this year and will carry the fourth scheduled Dragon cargo mission to the ISS (sixth flight of the Dragon overall).

This will have a 'low probability of success' because the rocket will be without its stabilising landing struts, according to SapceX.

The first attempt to touch down on a barge will be on flight 14, which could be as early as October.

This would be the first rocket ever successfully retrieved from space without landing in water.

On these initial flights, SpaceX is being very cautious with the rocket's re-entry through the atmosphere.

They are using a lot of fuel to bring the speed down as much as possible to prevent significant damage being done to the rocket.

In future, however, it's likely they will push the limits of re-entry forces so they are able to waste less fuel bringing the rocket back to Earth.

The development of this capability is an important step in making rockets reusable.

SpaceX's ultimate goal is to have rockets launch to orbit then return to Earth intact.