SpaceX launches two communications satellites
SpaceX today successfully launched two communications satellites for the satellite company SES, beginning SpaceX’s contract to launch more satellites in its constellation of medium-Earth orbit satellites, replacing the Russians.
The first stage successfully flew its eighth flight, and landed successfully on a drone ship in the Atlantic.
This was also the company’s second launch today, with another launch scheduled for tomorrow.
The leaders in the 2022 launch race:
60 China
58 SpaceX
21 Russia
9 Rocket Lab
8 ULA
The U.S. now leads China 82 to 60 in the national rankings, but trails the entire world combined 92 to 82.
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SpaceX today successfully launched two communications satellites for the satellite company SES, beginning SpaceX’s contract to launch more satellites in its constellation of medium-Earth orbit satellites, replacing the Russians.
The first stage successfully flew its eighth flight, and landed successfully on a drone ship in the Atlantic.
This was also the company’s second launch today, with another launch scheduled for tomorrow.
The leaders in the 2022 launch race:
60 China
58 SpaceX
21 Russia
9 Rocket Lab
8 ULA
The U.S. now leads China 82 to 60 in the national rankings, but trails the entire world combined 92 to 82.
Readers!
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black. Your support allows 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. 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. Only now does it appear that Washington might finally 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.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are four 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 or subscription:
4. 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.
Looks like SpaceX is not going to have difficulty hitting Elon’s goal of 60 launches this year.
Richard M,
It is an updated goal. At the beginning of the year they were hoping for only 50 launches. It looks like they may be able to achieve next year’s goal of 100 launches. The space business is really heating up.
Edward,
Right.
It looks like SpaceX has three more launches they can get in for December, assuming nothing unexpected: 2 Starlinks, and one for the Israelis. That would give them 61 for the year, which exceeds even the “updated” goal.
It is truly remarkable, and something basically inconceivable to SpaceX skeptics a decade – heck, a few years – ago.
100 in 2023 doesn’t seem so far-fetched.
As I see it, by the way, SpaceX already has two prerequisites for a 100 launch total fairly well in hand: they clearly have prospect of the payloads to fill 100 launches, and they have shown, in spurts, the ability to do two launches per week (hell, they’ll do 4 this week!).
So what remains to achieve this goal is:
1) Fabricate and deliver two Falcon 9 second stages every week, consistently;
2) Ranges on both coasts must be able to accommodate this increased cadence;
3) No RUDs.
I don’t know if they can pull it off; payload delivery might be an issue (which is why so many Falcon Heavy launches have been pushed back). The ranges will be pushed hard with Vulcan, Firefly, and Terran-1 coming online. But honestly, I’ll be surprised if they can’t manage 80-90. They’ll have 7 launches for December, and that’s pretty much the pace they would need to hit 80-90.
Every time I see a Falcon 9 on the pad, one that has already orbited 2 multi-ton cargoes, 8 astronauts, and 3 X 50+ comm sats, and then watch it jump right off said pad to do it flawlessly again, my mind is just boggled. And nobody in the world can do it, any of it, more than once!
The last “working” F9 should end up in the Smithsonian Air & Space Museum, right next to the Wright Flyer.
Richard M,
SpaceX has been ramping up the cadence all year, so seven launches per month is likely to become a small number by the middle of next year. The ranges have changed their methods so that they can more quickly switch from launching one rocket to another than they were able to do in the past. This change happened because the commercial companies warned them that such rapid launch cadences were coming. Commercial companies are more serious about launch than the government ever was. Payload delivery may still be a problem, but commercial payloads have great incentive to launch close to on time, as they need to start revenue operations sooner, not later. Since the goal is 2 launches per week, SpaceX had better have a plan to make that many upper stages.
As for RUDs, the track record is on the side of every rocket that has launched a great number of times. The track record is not perfect, but pad explosions are rare for well established launch vehicles.
If Starship becomes operational next year then I don’t know how much longer the Falcons will be such a preferred launch vehicle. They will still be needed for the CRS and Commercial Crew flights.
So far, this decade has been exciting for the space industry. There have been some unexpected setbacks, and we are not as far along as I had expected we would be by now, but it is more exciting that the 2010s, which was more exciting that the 2000s.
All: We must remember that about half of SpaceX’s launches this year were to put Starlink satellites into orbit. We must also remember that the reason Musk predicted 100 launches next year was to increase that number, expressly because he realized Starship would not be ready as he hoped.
Thus, Starlink will be responsible for delivering the payloads for probably 70 or so of those predicted 2023 100 launches, something it is very likely to achieve.
Hello Edward,
I think my main point was that the most *likely* obstacles to SpaceX not hitting 100 launches were largely outside its control: it can’t control what the ranges do, and aside from Starlink sats, they have no control over when their customer payloads will be ready. So, I suspect, if they fall short, it won’t be SpaceX’s fault, unless the Starlink factory burns to the ground!
If Starship becomes operational next year then I don’t know how much longer the Falcons will be such a preferred launch vehicle. They will still be needed for the CRS and Commercial Crew flights.
I’m a bit more cautious about Starship now, given how its development has slowed. Well, let me qualify that: I think the pace of development is as fast as it ever was, but SpaceX’s tolerance for risk has dropped, partially because NASA is in the picture now, but mainly because (as Elon Musk himself has noted) SpaceX simply cannot afford to have a Starship stack blow up and wreck the orbital launch pad at Boca Chica. And the truth is, their Boca Chica team made some unforced errors, along with learning some unexpected hard lessons, in developing and building out the GSE (“Stage Zero” and associated propellant infrastructure) at Starbase, and that’s really whats bogged them down this year. [See RGV’s and Zack Golden’s Youtube coverage for the details on that.] And maybe, we all ought to have expected that. This architecture is just….staggeringly ambitious. And that’s a good thing! But it don’t come easy.
I think they’ll get there, in the end, but it’s clearly taking longer than Elon had hoped. I think they’ll launch, more than once, to orbit in 2023, but it’s clearly going to take a little longer to get Starship into any kind of operational cadence than we all hoped. Fortunately, Falcon 9 is such a workhorse. And I think it will be carrying the main load through at least 2024. That’s survivable.
Robert and Richard,
I think we three are in violent agreement on these points. For payload delays, it is usually government and startup-company payloads that have the most delays. Once a company has payload cadence on its side then the going is smoother. Although I acknowledge the possibility that SpaceX will not get 100 payloads to launch next year, I think they have a good enough chance to reasonably announce that as a goal.
Starship’s main problem, as far as I can tell, is that they didn’t use any flame “trenches” (at sea level, how far down can they dig?)or deflectors to prevent the acoustical noise from impinging back onto the booster. This is one of many surprises that SpaceX has done in the past few years. It may be biting them in the buns, right now. However, after their recent static-fire tests they are not putting in a deflector, yet, so it seems that they still believe that they can and should launch without one, so maybe the bite in the buns isn’t too bad.
The July incident was relatively easily corrected by SpaceX by flooding the pad with N2 to reduce the effect of any fuel ignition. ULA prevented that problem by igniting their H2 fuel as it exhausted, but SpaceX went another direction.
My suspicion is still that SpaceX would have tried a B4-S20 launch attempt about a year ago, had the FAA not dragged their feet. This would have given them plenty of data points to ponder until they could launch their next one. As it is, they are light on practical experience, and there are a whole lot of lessons left for them to learn.
I tried a Zack Golden video a few weeks ago and wasn’t so impressed. He seems to be guessing and presuming far more than I want to take seriously.