SpaceX achieved another significant launch milestone as a Falcon 9 rocket successfully carried 23 Starlink spacecraft into orbit from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station on Sunday (Jan. 14) at 8:52 p.m. EST (0152 GMT on Jan. 15).
The entire mission unfolded smoothly, prompting SpaceX to celebrate the success in a post on X later that evening.
The Falcon 9’s first stage completed a successful return to Earth about eight minutes after liftoff, landing on the drone ship A Shortfall of Gravitas in the Atlantic Ocean.
This marked the 12th launch and landing for the booster, with seven previous missions dedicated to Starlink deployments, Space.com reported.
The Sunday night launch constituted the second part of a Starlink doubleheader, as another Falcon 9 had earlier lifted a Starlink batch from California’s Vandenberg Space Force Base on the same day.
Starlink, SpaceX’s broadband megaconstellation, currently boasts over 5,250 operational spacecraft, with this number continually increasing, evident from Sunday’s successful dual liftoffs.
Written by B.C. Begley
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B.C. Begley 