SpaceX launches three O3b communications satellites
SpaceX today successfully launched three O3b communications satellites for the Luxembourg satellite company SES, its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida.
This was SpaceX’s fifth launch for this SES constellation. It has now placed thirteen of these type satellites into orbit, and has completed 20 launches for SES overall. As of posting the satellites have not yet been deployed.
The first stage (B1080) completed its 29th flight (61 days after its previous mission), landing on a drone ship in the Atlantic. The two fairings completed their 27th and 10th flights respectively.
The leader board for the 2026 launch race:
107 SpaceX
56 China
14 Rocket Lab (plus two suborbital HASTE launches)
11 Russia
For the third straight year SpaceX leads the entire world combined in total launches, 107 to 100.
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This was SpaceX’s fifth launch for this SES constellation.
Sixth.
Elon needs to think twice about phasing out this rocket.
Falcon 9 is, ultimately, too expensive and not capable enough for what SpaceX plans. On top of that, it’s not being phased out yet. SpaceX simply isn’t flying Starlink launches from Florida anymore. That suggests they feel pretty confident about moving future Starlink flights to Starship, and soon. Once Starship is flying regularly, they’ll be moving to wind down F9 and FH launches as quickly as they can, as that will save them money running only one type of rocket rather than three. SpaceX plans to deploy some 60 Tbps of capacity per Starship launch, so at current Falcon 9 rates, it would take seven Starship launches to exceed the total capacity Falcon 9 could put into orbit for an entire year. That performance differential is enormous, and should make it clear why SpaceX wants to move on. To restate my initial argument: their costs will be higher, and their capabilities lower, flying Falcon 9 for longer than they have to.
I disagree at this time on the information that I have. If Falcon is profitable, then it is not too expensive. Multiple vehicle types are not necessarily a problem depending on usage. Also, Starship is not proven at this time, and certainly not 20-30 times the capacity per launch.
I’m referring to Starmind, settling Mars, and building a mass driver and industry on the Moon. The Falcon 9 can’t do those, not without substantial additional development and more money. Yes, it’s great for Dragon, for Starlink V2, and for launching small-scale efforts like what Besxar and Varda (among others) are doing, but SpaceX needs something more capable for what Musk envisions. They never built more than five or six pads for F9, and they already have over a dozen planned for Starship.
As for Starship being unproven, sure. But even with how many Starlinks are flying on their test flights they’re still carrying nearly eight times as much bandwidth per launch as Falcon 9 can manage, There’s no great reason to assume that twenty satellites are all that Starship can carry-we simply do not know. Assuming that SpaceX can make a profit on the launch they sold Voyager (for $90 million), then they can profitably fly even twenty Starlink V3s to orbit. Even if it cost $100 million/flight, it would be cheaper to launch Starlinks via Starship than to continue flying them on the Falcon 9.
Multiple vehicles are not necessarily a problem, except that it means SpaceX runs multiple production lines, and ties up people on older systems that perhaps they’d prefer to use elsewhere. Three quarters of SpaceX’s launches in 2025 were for Starlink. and some 60% of those were from Florida. With SpaceX ending said launches, that’s basically four-tenths of F9’s manifest gone. Yes, F9 is still profitable, but it won’t take an absurd number of launches for Starship to replace all F9 Starlink flights combined (an order of magnitude less, actually, even if they remained limited to twenty satellites per launch). There will be a transition period as Starship builds up its flight rate and SpaceX winds down the older rockets, I have never denied that, but it won’t be forever, and they’ll try to make it as fast as they can. My guess is Falcon 9 will retire no earlier than 2032, and probably more like 2035. Vandenberg is likely to be the last holdout.
I believe that the driving factor behind continued F9 production is Dragon. Simply put, there is no other proven and modern manned space vehicle. No, forget the Russians, and even if someone finally gets Dreamchaser going, what booster will power it through man-rating? It needs to get going!
Although many versions of Starship will no doubt exist, I cannot recommend that a crew taxi suitable for takeoff to and reentry from LEO should be one of them – it’s just too big to waste on the relatively small crews we actually need until the time we embark on Mars missions. Until then a Dragon XL or Dreamchaser XL will do fine, and those have a ready escape mode too.
The only (pre-Mars era) Starship built for humans should be a design that launches empty, without heatshield or fins, and remains in space for its service life.
I notice you leave out Starliner entirely. I kind of agree, but I find it interesting.
Yes, I think NASA has (with good reason) written off Boeing as a major supplier.
And notice I refer to Dragon / Dreamchaser “XL”, to suggest that ferry versions could well be developed to transport larger crews in a shortened ferry mission profile.
Now, who in their right mind would suggest a similar investment in StarLiner?!
However, your confidence in Dream Chaser I think is overrated. Sierra Space has performed as badly as Boeing in this matter.
We need more manned spacecraft for getting up and down from Earth. I am worried no one but SpaceX appears up to the job.
Yes, I agree – maybe Elon can produce a good spaceplane that can land on runways, or at least land propulsively on dry land. I think we have to get past this landing in the ocean thing! Sooner or later, it’s going to go terribly wrong!
By the way, the ferry approach to crewed Starships is most important IMHO! Can you imagine how wasteful it would be for a LEO / Lunar / Lagrange / Asteriods Starship to lug around a heatshield and fins on dozens of missions?! You can get reuse a lot simpler by just ferrying the crew, rather than landing back on Earth!
Or better yet, we build much bigger space stations!
Simple question.
Could a Falcon 9 launch from Florida or Texas and land in California?
Even if it didn’t have a second stage and used all the lift for its own flight.
No.
Thanks, I though so but was not sure.