SpaceX is preparing for a surge of geostationary communications satellite launches after several slow years. In the late 2010s, orders of large geostationary commsats plummeted. Formerly a mainstay of the commercial launch industry, western geostationary satellite launches became much rarer in 2019 and the early 2020s. That downturn was especially noticeable for SpaceX, where geostationary […]
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SpaceX has revealed a new and mysterious reason to delay its own rocket launch: something called “constellation optimization.” Known as Starlink 2-4, the mission is now scheduled to launch a batch of 51 Starlink V1.5 satellites to a semi-polar Earth orbit no earlier than (NET) 8:15 am PST (16:15 UTC) on Sunday, January 15th. That […]
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SpaceX has successfully completed its second launch for OneWeb, carrying another 40 of the London-based company’s small communications satellites into orbit. Similar to SpaceX’s own Starlink constellation, OneWeb’s primary goal is to serve internet to customers almost anywhere on Earth, particularly in places where traditional high-bandwidth connectivity is currently unavailable or unlikely to ever be […]
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SpaceX is reportedly planning to launch its first Starlink mission of 2023 from California’s Vandenberg Space Force Base. Next Spaceflight reports that SpaceX is preparing to launch Starlink 2-4 no earlier than (NET) 6:54 pm PST on January 8th, almost eight weeks after unspecified issues with a Falcon 9 rocket indefinitely delayed the mission. While […]
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After rounding out 2022 with the world’s last orbital launch, SpaceX is on track to kick off 2023 with the new year’s first orbital launch – also the second-largest rideshare mission in history. No earlier than (NET) 9:56 am EST (14:56 UTC), a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket is scheduled to lift off on Transporter-6, the […]
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SpaceX has tied a 42-year-old record with its 61st and final Falcon rocket launch of 2022. Also marking the latest in a calendar year SpaceX has launched a rocket, a Falcon 9 lifted off from the company’s Vandenberg Space Force Base (VSFB) SLC-4E pad at 11:38 pm PST, Thursday, December 29th (7:38 UTC 30 Dec) […]
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SpaceX has completed its 60th orbital launch of 2022, marking the first time the company has fully hit a public cadence target set by one of its executives. By every possible measure, 2022 has been a groundbreaking year for SpaceX even when considering the vast list of achievements it’s racked up over the last half-decade. […]
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In a strange twist, SpaceX says that its next Starlink mission will launch 54 satellites into low Earth orbit (LEO), implying that they’re roughly the same size as the V1.5 satellites it’s already launching – not the larger V2 or V2 Mini satellites discussed in recent FCC filings. However, the data SpaceX provided also shows […]
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SpaceX has won a contract to launch the joint US-European Sentinel 6B radar satellite as early as November 2025. Five years ago, NASA also chose SpaceX to launch Sentinel 6A, the first of two identical satellites designed to use radar altimeters to determine global sea levels more accurately than ever before. In October 2017, just […]
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SpaceX has successfully launched three Falcon 9 rockets less than 34 hours apart, leaving the company only one mission shy of CEO Elon Musk’s ambitious target of 60 launches in 2022. The period was almost even more intense, with two launches briefly scheduled minutes apart and all three set to launch in the space of […]
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