SpaceX launches 28 Starlink satellites, reuses 1st stage for 29th time
SpaceX last night successfully launched another 28 Starlink satellites, its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California.
The first stage, B1071, completed its 29th flight, landing on a drone ship in the Pacific. The present rankings for the most reflights of a rocket:
39 Discovery space shuttle
33 Atlantis space shuttle
30 Falcon 9 booster B1067
29 Falcon 9 booster B1071
28 Columbia space shuttle
28 Falcon 9 booster B1063
27 Falcon 9 booster B1069
Note also that SpaceX was able to refly this stage only 24 days after its previous flight. Even after 28 flights, the booster appears so robust the company can get it back in the air only weeks later.
The leaders in the 2025 launch race:
129 SpaceX
58 China
13 Russia
12 Rocket Lab
SpaceX now leads the rest of the world in successful launches, 129 to 98. SpaceX has another launch scheduled for this evening, placing another set of Amazon’s Kuiper satellites into orbit.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The print edition can be purchased at Amazon or from any other book seller. If you want an autographed copy the price is $60 for the hardback and $45 for the paperback, plus $8 shipping for each. Go here for purchasing details. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
SpaceX last night successfully launched another 28 Starlink satellites, its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California.
The first stage, B1071, completed its 29th flight, landing on a drone ship in the Pacific. The present rankings for the most reflights of a rocket:
39 Discovery space shuttle
33 Atlantis space shuttle
30 Falcon 9 booster B1067
29 Falcon 9 booster B1071
28 Columbia space shuttle
28 Falcon 9 booster B1063
27 Falcon 9 booster B1069
Note also that SpaceX was able to refly this stage only 24 days after its previous flight. Even after 28 flights, the booster appears so robust the company can get it back in the air only weeks later.
The leaders in the 2025 launch race:
129 SpaceX
58 China
13 Russia
12 Rocket Lab
SpaceX now leads the rest of the world in successful launches, 129 to 98. SpaceX has another launch scheduled for this evening, placing another set of Amazon’s Kuiper satellites into orbit.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The print edition can be purchased at Amazon or from any other book seller. If you want an autographed copy the price is $60 for the hardback and $45 for the paperback, plus $8 shipping for each. Go here for purchasing details. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
Not an accounting-guy, but that has to be the lowest marginal-cost rocket launch, ever.
Could be. Some of the earlier designs they didn’t want to keep re-using due to complexity may have been even cheaper.
They were recovered enough to recoup their cost, but allowed to go in the drink at the last–the final flight not needing drone ship support, legs, etc.
Those final flights are likely to be the least expensive.
It could be that, for all FH’s power, 20 tons is the max to have all three cores back?