SpaceX launches twice today from different Florida launchpads
SpaceX today successfully launched twice. First a Falcon 9 rocket lifted off from Kennedy Space Center in Florida, placing a South Korean communications satellite in geosynchronous orbit. The first stage completed its 23rd flight, landing back at Cape Canaveral.
Then, several hours later, a Falcon 9 lifted off from Cape Canaveral, placing 24 Starlink satellites in orbit. The first stage completed its 12th flight, landing on a drone ship in the Atlantic.
UPDATE: China also completed a launch earlier today, its Lijian-1 rocket lifting off from its “commercial” launchpad at its Jiuquan spaceport in northwest China. No word on where the lower stages crashed inside China. The payload was fifteen satellites, including a remote-sensing satellite for Oman.
The leaders in the 2024 launch race:
112 SpaceX
51 China
13 Russia
12 Rocket Lab
American private enterprise now leads the rest of the world combined in successful launches 130 to 76, while SpaceX by itself leads the entire world, including American companies, 112 to 94.
The support of my readers through the years has given me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Four years ago, just before the 2020 election I wrote that Joe Biden's mental health was suspect. Only in this year has the propaganda mainstream media decided to recognize that basic fact.
Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Even today NASA and Congress refuse to recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
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SpaceX today successfully launched twice. First a Falcon 9 rocket lifted off from Kennedy Space Center in Florida, placing a South Korean communications satellite in geosynchronous orbit. The first stage completed its 23rd flight, landing back at Cape Canaveral.
Then, several hours later, a Falcon 9 lifted off from Cape Canaveral, placing 24 Starlink satellites in orbit. The first stage completed its 12th flight, landing on a drone ship in the Atlantic.
UPDATE: China also completed a launch earlier today, its Lijian-1 rocket lifting off from its “commercial” launchpad at its Jiuquan spaceport in northwest China. No word on where the lower stages crashed inside China. The payload was fifteen satellites, including a remote-sensing satellite for Oman.
The leaders in the 2024 launch race:
112 SpaceX
51 China
13 Russia
12 Rocket Lab
American private enterprise now leads the rest of the world combined in successful launches 130 to 76, while SpaceX by itself leads the entire world, including American companies, 112 to 94.
The support of my readers through the years has given me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Four years ago, just before the 2020 election I wrote that Joe Biden's mental health was suspect. Only in this year has the propaganda mainstream media decided to recognize that basic fact.
Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Even today NASA and Congress refuse to recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are five ways of doing so:
1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.
2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation.
3. A Paypal Donation:
5. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
P.O.Box 1262
Cortaro, AZ 85652
You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above. And if you buy the books through the ebookit links, I get a larger cut and I get it sooner.
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