SpaceX – Page 2 – Virtual Orbit

18May

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SpaceX

SpaceX rocket, Starlink satellites launch from pad 39A – Spaceflight Now

Live coverage of the countdown and launch of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Launch Complex 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The Starlink 4-18 mission launched SpaceX’s next batch of 53 Starlink broadband satellites. Follow us on Twitter. SFN Live SpaceX’s third Starlink satellite deployment mission in five days launched at 6:59 a.m. EDT (1059 GMT) Wednesday from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. A Falcon 9 rocket carried 53 more Starlink internet satellites into orbit. The commercial space company wheeled the Falcon 9 rocket to pad 39A on Tuesday, then raised the rocket vertical in preparation for liftoff just after sunrise Wednesday. SpaceX recovered the first stage booster, making its fifth trip to space, on the deck of the drone ship “A Shortfall of Gravitas”...

Geostationary comsats delivered to Florida for SpaceX launches in June – Spaceflight Now

17May

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SpaceX

Geostationary comsats delivered to Florida for SpaceX launches in June – Spaceflight Now

A spacecraft container is unloaded from a transport ship Saturday at Port Canaveral, Florida. Credit: Stephen Clark / Spaceflight Now A transport ship delivered the SES 22 and Nilesat 301 geostationary communications satellites to Cape Canaveral over the weekend to prepare for two launches on SpaceX rockets in June, completing a trans-Atlantic journey from France originally planned on Russian-owned cargo planes. The satellites will be prepared for launches on two Falcon 9 rockets next month. Nilesat 301 is scheduled for liftoff June 10 from pad 40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, and SES 22 is set for launch in late June. Thales Alenia Space, which assembled the satellites in Cannes, France, originally planned to deliver the Nilesat 301 and SES 22 spacecraft to Cape Canaveral on Rus...

SpaceX’s first-gen Starlink fleet halfway complete after back-to-back launches – Spaceflight Now

16May

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SpaceX

SpaceX’s first-gen Starlink fleet halfway complete after back-to-back launches – Spaceflight Now

A Falcon 9 rocket lifts off from Cape Canaveral on Saturday with the Starlink 4-15 mission. Credit: SpaceX More than half of the spacecraft SpaceX needs to fill the company’s first-generation fleet of 4,408 Starlink satellites are now in orbit, following the addition of 106 new internet relay nodes launched on two Falcon 9 rockets Friday and Saturday. Two Falcon 9 rockets each delivered 53 Starlink payloads to orbit after liftoff from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California and Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida, SpaceX’s 19th and 20th missions of the year. The second of the back-to-back launches took off at 4:40:50 p.m. EDT (2040:50 GMT) Saturday from pad 40 at Cape Canaveral. The Falcon 9 was powered by a new reusable first stage booster — tail number B1073 — that made a su...

SpaceX passes 2,500 satellites launched for Starlink internet network – Spaceflight Now

15May

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SpaceX

SpaceX passes 2,500 satellites launched for Starlink internet network – Spaceflight Now

A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket climbs into the sky over Vandenberg Space Force Base to begin the Starlink 4-13 mission. Credit: Gene Blevins / LA Daily News SpaceX launched a Falcon 9 rocket Friday afternoon from California’s Central Coast with another batch 53 Starlink internet satellites, pushing the total number of spacecraft launched in the network above 2,500, including testbeds and prototypes already cycled out of the fleet. The Falcon 9 lifted off at 3:07:50 p.m. PDT (6:07:50 p.m. EDT: 2207:50 GMT) Friday from Vandenberg Space Force Base, a military spaceport between Los Angeles and San Francisco. With winds at Vandenberg near the Falcon 9’s launch limit, the 229-foot-tall (70-meter) rocket powered through a sunny sky with nine Merlin engines throttling up to 1.7 million pounds of thrust...

14May

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SpaceX

SpaceX readies Falcon 9 rocket for launch today – Spaceflight Now

Live coverage of the countdown and launch of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Space Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida. The Starlink 4-15 mission will launch SpaceX’s next batch of 53 Starlink broadband satellites. Follow us on Twitter. SFN Live Less than 24 hours after launching Starlink satellites from California, SpaceX is set to loft another 53 internet relay stations a 4:40 p.m. EDT (2040 GMT) Saturday from Cape Canaveral aboard a Falcon 9 rocket. It will be SpaceX’s 20th launch of the year, and the second of 2022 to debut a new Falcon 9 booster. The booster will target a landing on SpaceX’s drone ship “Just Read the Instructions” floating in the Atlantic Ocean northeast of Cape Canaveral. SpaceX plans to complete preparations on the Falcon 9 rock...