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SpaceX launches 56 Starlink satellites into orbit

Using its Falcon 9 rocket, SpaceX tonight successfully placed 56 Starlink satellites into orbit, lifting off from Cape Canaveral.

The first stage completed its seventh flight, landing safely on a drone ship in the Atlantic. The two fairing halves completed their eighth and ninth flights, respectively.

The leaders in the 2023 launch race:

29 SpaceX
16 China
6 Russia
3 Rocket Lab
3 India

American private enterprise now leads China 32 to 16 in the national rankings, and the entire world combined 32 to 28. SpaceX now trails the rest of the world, including American companies, 29 to 31.

Genesis cover

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 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

5 comments

  • Pettifogger

    The numbers above show SpaceX and Rocket Lab leading the world 32 to 25, not 28. Likewise, they show SpaceX still in the lead 29 to 28. Or should I not be helping my 2nd-grade grandson with his arithmetic? :-)

  • Pettifogger: I don’t claim to be a math genius either, but my numbers are right. The list does not show all launches so far, only the “leaders.” This is why the world count is higher than what you see.

  • Mark

    Well if you want to nit pick, Starship would have made it 30 but failed to reach orbit. :-)

  • Concerned

    Mark– whether or not to categorize the planned Starship test as orbital is a real can of worms. Much debate about that in other forums. From an energy standpoint it is practically orbital, from a geometric standpoint, not quite. Kinda like the debate over Pluto’s status as a planet.

  • All: I can say now that during the next test launch of Superheavy/Starship if Starship comes back to Earth anywhere near its planned target east of Hawaii, I will call that launch an orbital flight.

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