SpaceX launches another 22 Starlink satellites
In its second launch from Cape Canaveral in less than 24 hours, SpaceX today placed another 22 Starlink satellites into orbit, using its Falcon 9 rocket.
The first stage completed its third flight, landing successfully on a drone ship in the Atlantic.
The leaders in the 2023 launch race:
59 SpaceX
37 China
12 Russia
7 Rocket Lab
In the national rankings, American private enterprise now leads China in successful launches 68 to 37. It also leads the entire world combined, 68 to 60, while SpaceX by itself now trails the rest of the world (excluding American companies) 59 to 60 in successful launches.
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
In its second launch from Cape Canaveral in less than 24 hours, SpaceX today placed another 22 Starlink satellites into orbit, using its Falcon 9 rocket.
The first stage completed its third flight, landing successfully on a drone ship in the Atlantic.
The leaders in the 2023 launch race:
59 SpaceX
37 China
12 Russia
7 Rocket Lab
In the national rankings, American private enterprise now leads China in successful launches 68 to 37. It also leads the entire world combined, 68 to 60, while SpaceX by itself now trails the rest of the world (excluding American companies) 59 to 60 in successful launches.
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
My wife saw her first Starlink satellite “train” a while back while stargazing in Yellowstone Park. We had no clue what it was initially, but her friend found a reference to it the next day and we did some ‘net surfing. We found a site that provides a schedule of potential viewing of the trains here:
https://findstarlink.com
The next night was forecast to be good visibility and we were lucky with the weather. Right on time they popped over the mountain to our west and in an almost perfect line proceeded to the east-southeast where, when they hit the Milky Way, seemd to drop out of existence as they passed into the Earth’s shadow.
It’s too bad that this latest launch doesn’t have any good visibility for us here, but I keep checking after each launch to see if we’ll be able to spot them. The train is really incredibly bright and fast-moving due to the low orbits. I could easily see people mistaking them for some manned object since they formation is so linear.
Some scuttlebutt that SuperHeavy will go to 42 engines
https://forum.cosmoquest.org/forum/science-and-space/space-exploration/126015-spacex-except-for-starlink?p=3719903#post3719903
I post some ideas about water hammer here in the comments section:
https://spacenews.com/spacex-test-fires-booster-for-second-starship-launch/
Some future models of Starship will almost certainly get three more Raptor vacuum engines apiece which would bring the engine count for the entire Starship stack to 42 – 33 on Super Heavy and 9 on up-engined Starships. This would make excellent sense for, say, tanker Starships and those designed to carry Starlink V2 and successor satellites. Three more Rvac engines would allow a swifter ascent of a heavier payload at higher Gs. Propellant is insensitive to G forces and Starlink sats can be designed to be too.
There is no room for 42 engines on Super Heavy itself. If SpaceX ever builds a Super Duper Heavy with 42 engines, it will have to have a larger base diameter and will require a new launch platform as the current one would be too small.
That makes sense.
I hadn’t seen you at space news…everything okay?
As I read it, the scuttlebutt says 42 engines total, between the two stages, achieved by adding three more vacuum Raptors to the second stage, the Starship. As noted by another commenter, there isn’t any more room in the Superheavy.
By the way, this launch seemed somewhat “old school” in terms of presentation, and booster return profile. And of course, success.
BTW came across this article today. Gives insight into the thinking of the left wing opposition to Musk.
https://mashable.com/article/spacex-starship-launch-environmental-damage
“A group of blue land crabs and seven bobwhite quail eggs were “incinerated” by the launch.”
Quite the tragedy.
Funniest line is the last one:
“Pad site was totally destroyed and will likely force them to re-design the whole thing,” the official wrote. “Probably won’t see another launch for a while.””
The article was published the day after the successful static fire of SH on the fully rebuilt, water deluge equipped pad!
Suppose the Wildlife official is used to gov’t timelines.
I imagine Musk would have liked to have been able to say something like this
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g7-tskP0OzI
https://tpwd.texas.gov/regulations/outdoor-annual/regs/animals/quail
https://tpwd.texas.gov/regulations/outdoor-annual/fishing/shellfish-regulations/crab-and-ghost-shrimp-legal-devices-and-restrictions
There is also a blue land crab and all three are legal to hunt and harvest.
Complaining about them being inside the launch area is like complaining about deer being in the road.
My favorite shuttle video
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=zTCjx5DEPkE
Robert
It is great that you track this, huge thanks.
But there should really be a standard database that contains the number of kilograms, number of satellites, number of astronauts, and miles from earth for every launch on the planet.
Does anyone know of one, or do one of us here need to create an open source one?
Thanks for all you do.
David K: Your idea has been proposed multiple times. It is worthwhile information, but more work than I wish to do, since my goal remains tracking actual concrete success in getting into orbit.
If someone wanted to do it the math and provide it for me to post here periodically, I would be glad to do so. Any volunteers?