SpaceX tonight successfully launches another 22 Starlink satellites
SpaceX tonight successfully launched another 22 Starlink satellites, using its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from Cape Canaveral.
The first stage completed its fourth flight, landing softly on a drone ship in the Atlantic. The two fairing halves completed their 8th and 10th flights respectively. As of posting the satellites have not yet been deployed.
The leaders in the 2023 launch race:
53 SpaceX
31 China
9 Russia
6 Rocket Lab
6 India
American private enterprise now leads China in successful launches 61 to 31, and the entire world combined 61 to 51, while SpaceX by itself leads the world (excluding American companies) 53 to 51.
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 print edition can be purchased at Amazon. from any other book seller, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit.
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
SpaceX tonight successfully launched another 22 Starlink satellites, using its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from Cape Canaveral.
The first stage completed its fourth flight, landing softly on a drone ship in the Atlantic. The two fairing halves completed their 8th and 10th flights respectively. As of posting the satellites have not yet been deployed.
The leaders in the 2023 launch race:
53 SpaceX
31 China
9 Russia
6 Rocket Lab
6 India
American private enterprise now leads China in successful launches 61 to 31, and the entire world combined 61 to 51, while SpaceX by itself leads the world (excluding American companies) 53 to 51.
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 print edition can be purchased at Amazon. from any other book seller, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. 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
Looks like they are testing the cadence of SLC-40 now that LC-39A is basically launching 1-2 times a month at most due to F-H -> Dragon -> F-H switch time delays. Now they seem limitd by ASDS availability and then how fast they can recycle the pad.
Answer looks to be pretty quick!!!
If they can get Vandenberg to the cadence SLC-40 is showing (alas only one ASDS out there) then that 100 launch target looks suddenly more doable..
I’d put the achievable launch cadence closer to 90 for this year and probably next. It has taken a lot of work to get SLC-40 to its current 5-day turnaround time, and that roughly matches the turnaround time for recovery boosters with the two ASDS and more limited flight rate from 39A. Improving SLC-40 turn-around has been a long, incremental process. Increasing use of return-to-launch-site can relieve some time constraints on ASDS, and it looks like they’ll try to do that with launches to ISS now. Vandenberg does not appear to be close to that turn-around rate, and I’m guessing that pad turn-around is the constraint, rather than the single ASDS.
The other constraint on launch rate is minimizing delays, either from launch aborts or from weather. We’re approaching peak hurricane season so there will be more weather delays between now and mid-November.
Getting to 90 this year means a launch cadence of about 8 launches per month for the rest of the year. That seems achievable only if there are no delays of any type.
Diane Wilson wrote: “Getting to 90 this year means a launch cadence of about 8 launches per month for the rest of the year. That seems achievable only if there are no delays of any type.”
Reaching 100 flights this year would mean 10 launches per month for the rest of the year, and that may be tricky. Since they probably cannot do that rate this month, then December would have to make up for the difference, 11 or 12 or more launches. Can they really ramp up that much in the next five months? I’m with Diane and doubt it, too.
For 100 flights next year, they would need to average 8-1/3 flights per month, including successful Starship flights. I look forward to seeing what SpaceX can do next year.
Of course, the prize is not in reaching cadence milestones but in making sure the business operates smoothly. This one company is achieving what the commercial satellite industry had begged for in the 1990s: inexpensive access to space. With SpaceX, access is routinely available and costs less than $2,000 per pound. ($67 million to put up to 38,000 pounds into orbit.)
I’m also hoping that some other launch companies get busy. If New Glenn can make orbit next year, I would be happy to see it enter the competition. Rocket lab is also picking up the pace, and if their soaking wet rockets can fly again, I would be happy — yet at the same time amazed. (Perhaps they may name that mission “Destry Flies Again,” pleasing old movie buffs.)
I was able to see some of the second stage flight from the west side of Phoenix – mostly an arcing diffuse cloud of moderate brightness. Watching the flight video at the same time, the onboard camera showed the sun appear at the limb of the earth, before receding again as the rocket travelled further southeast. This launch was an hour after Vandenberg’s sunset, so I’ll just have to wait for one set closer to it for a really nice show.
Damn, disregard my previous post – I’d though this was about the Vandenberg launch.
Diane Wilson wrote: “Getting to 90 this year means a launch cadence of about 8 launches per month for the rest of the year. That seems achievable only if there are no delays of any type.”
I had agreed with Diane, until I counted the number of SpaceX launches since July 7th. Nine. Including a Falcon Heavy. SpaceX already seems to have the ability to launch at the cadence of 9 per month, but it needs 10 per month for the rest of the year in order to achieve 100 flights to orbit this year.
I’m becoming more impressed with the company as time goes on. All that they need for 100 flights next year is to average 8-1/3 flights a month. Here are Robert’s posts for the time period of the nine launches:
– July 7: https://behindtheblack.com/behind-the-black/points-of-information/spacex-launches-another-48-starlink-satellites/
– July 9: https://behindtheblack.com/behind-the-black/points-of-information/spacex-launches-22-starlink-satellites-using-a-first-stage-for-16th-time/
– July 15: https://behindtheblack.com/behind-the-black/points-of-information/spacex-launches-using-its-second-falcon-9-first-stage-on-its-sixteenth-flight/
– July 19: https://behindtheblack.com/behind-the-black/points-of-information/spacex-launches-15-more-starlink-satellites-into-orbit/
– July 23: https://behindtheblack.com/behind-the-black/points-of-information/spacex-launches-another-22-starlink-satellites/
– July 27: https://behindtheblack.com/behind-the-black/points-of-information/spacexs-falcon-9-launches-another-22-starlink-satellites/
– July 28: https://behindtheblack.com/behind-the-black/points-of-information/spacexs-falcon-heavy-successfully-launches-the-heaviest-geosynchronous-communications-satellite-ever/
– Aug 6: https://behindtheblack.com/behind-the-black/points-of-information/spacex-tonight-successfully-launches-another-22-starlink-satellites/
– Aug 7: https://behindtheblack.com/behind-the-black/points-of-information/spacex-successfully-launches-another-15-starlink-satellites/
By the way, with the delay in Starship becoming operational, SpaceX has a huge incentive to launch a large number of Starlink satellites on Falcon rockets in a relatively short period of time, which requires a very rapid cadence. Biden’s administration may be harming Starship in the short run, but SpaceX is learning a lot about rapid turnaround.