SpaceX knocks out Sunday night launch from the Cape
SpaceX sent up another Starlink mission from the Space Coast on Sunday night on a southerly trajectory that hugged the Florida coast.
A Falcon 9 rocket on the Starlink 6-58 mission carrying 23 of the internet satellites lifted off at 8:53 p.m. liftoff from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station’s Space Launch Complex 40.
The southerly trajectory took the rocket down the Florida coast so its flight and booster separation was more visible in South Florida about an hour after sunset.
Liftoff! pic.twitter.com/9N3E7FDYW7
— SpaceX (@SpaceX) May 13, 2024
The first-stage booster flew for the 15th time with another recovery landing downrange in the Atlantic on the droneship A Shortfall of Gravitas.
This was the 36th launch from the Space Coast this year and 25th from Cape Canaveral with the other 11 coming from Kennedy Space Center. All but two of the launches have been flown by SpaceX.
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The other two were from United Launch Alliance, which is aiming for its third of the year no earlier than Friday when an Atlas V rocket carrying the CST-100 Starliner could launch on the Crew Flight Test mission carrying NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams to the International Space Station.
The duo flew back to Houston this weekend from the crew quarters at Kennedy Space Center, but will remain in quarantine, according to NASA.
If it flies it would be the third of up to six human spaceflights from Florida this year with SpaceX having already launched the private Axiom 3 mission as well as Crew-8 to the ISS for NASA.
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The other three are also for SpaceX with the private Polaris Dawn mission with billionaire Jared Isaacman aiming for early summer, Crew-9 as early as August and Axiom 4 as early as October.
The U.S. has not had this many orbital launches since 2001 when the Space Shuttle Program was active, and also flew six times.
The Starliner mission’s goal is to complete certification of the spacecraft so Boeing can join SpaceX with rotational missions of crew to the ISS with each flying once a year trading off duties every six months. Boeing has contracted to perform six of those missions with the first flying as early as February 2025 is the CFT mission goes well.