SpaceX this morning successfully placed another 24 Starlink satellites into orbit, its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California.
The first stage completed its 22nd flight, landing on a drone ship in the Pacific.
The leaders in the 2026 launch race:
64 SpaceX
30 China
8 Russia
7 Rocket Lab
For the third straight year SpaceX leads the entire world combined in total launches, 64 to 55.
SpaceX this morning successfully placed 29 more Starlink satellites into orbit, its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from Cape Canaveral Space Force station in Florida. The first stage completed its 16th flight (57 days after its last flight), landing on a drone ship in the Atlantic.
The leaders in the 2026 launch race:
63 SpaceX
30 China
8 Russia
7 Rocket Lab
For the third straight year SpaceX leads the entire world combined in total launches, 63 to 53.
ULA has an Atlas-5 launch scheduled for this evening to launch 29 Leo satellites for Amazon, but at the moment the weather does not look promising.
SpaceX this morning successfully launched 24 more Starlink satellites, its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California.
The first stage completed its sixth flight (32 days after its previous flight), landing on a drone ship in the Pacific.
The leaders in the 2026 launch race:
62 SpaceX
29 China
8 Russia
7 Rocket Lab
For the third straight year SpaceX leads the entire world combined in total launches, 62 to 52.
SpaceX early this morning successfully placed another 29 Starlink Satellites into orbit, its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida.
The first stage (B1078) completed its 28th flight, landing on a drone ship in the Atlantic, 64 days after its previous flight. With this flight, the booster moves into a tie for seventh place with the Columbia shuttle and another Falcon 9 booster in the rankings of the most reused launch vehicles:
39 Discovery space shuttle
34 Falcon 9 booster B1067
33 Atlantis space shuttle
33 Falcon 9 booster B1071
32 Falcon 9 booster B1063
31 Falcon 9 booster B1069
28 Columbia space shuttle
28 Falcon 9 booster B1077
28 Falcon 9 booster B1078
The leaders in the 2026 launch race:
61 SpaceX
29 China
8 Russia
7 Rocket Lab
For the third straight year SpaceX leads the entire world combined in total launches, 61 to 52.
SpaceX early today successfully placed another 29 Starlink satellites into orbit, its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida.
The first stage (B1077) completed its 28th flight, landing on a drone ship in the Atlantic, 64 days after its previous flight. With this flight, the booster moves into a tie for seventh place with the Columbia shuttle in the rankings of the most reused launch vehicles:
39 Discovery space shuttle
34 Falcon 9 booster B1067
33 Atlantis space shuttle
33 Falcon 9 booster B1071
32 Falcon 9 booster B1063
31 Falcon 9 booster B1069
28 Columbia space shuttle
28 Falcon 9 booster B1077
27 Falcon 9 booster B1078
The leaders in the 2026 launch race:
59 SpaceX
28 China
8 Russia
6 Rocket Lab
For the third straight year SpaceX leads the entire world combined in total launches, 59 to 50.
Artist rendering of Vast’s Haven-1 station, with a docked
Dragon capsule. Like Have Demo, it is being built using
company funds with no government support.
The space station startup Vast yesterday unveiled a new product line of high powered satellite buses, dubbed Vast Satellite, designed to support the expected boom in satellite construction.
With the launch of Vast Satellite, Vast is expanding beyond commercial space stations into high-volume spacecraft platforms designed for high-performance orbital missions. The first offering is a 15 kW-class satellite bus designed to support a wide array of power-intensive missions through flexible configurations.
Built around common in-house subsystems—including avionics, power, communications, propulsion, and flight software—Vast Satellite leverages technologies already developed for its Haven-1 space station, and validated through the successful Haven Demo mission in 2025. This shared architecture combined with Vast’s vertically integrated manufacturing model and advanced production capabilities is designed to support faster development timelines, lower costs, and increased mission reliability.
The company says it has already sold four buses to a confidential customer, with an option for 200 more. This sale occurred because Vast has proved itself with its policy of committing its own investment capital in designing, building, and flying demo missions. The Haven Demo was initially launched to test the subsystems to be used on the Haven-1 single module station the company hopes to fly next year on a three-year mission, during which four two-week manned crews will occupy it. That success allowed Vast to now diversify, using what it learned and proved on that demo to sell new products to other customers.
Similarly, its Haven-1 station, built on its own dime with no NASA funds, is intended to prove its capability as a space station provider. If successful, it is certain at that point to attract customers, including NASA.
SpaceX in the early morning hours today successfully placed another 24 Starlink satellites into orbit, its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California.
The first stage completed its second flight, landing on a drone ship in the Pacific.
The leaders in the 2026 launch race:
58 SpaceX
28 China
8 Russia
6 Rocket Lab
For the third straight year SpaceX leads the entire world combined in total launches, 58 to 50.
The spacecraft presently docked to ISS.
The unmanned Dragon capsule that SpaceX launched on May 15, 2026 successfully docked with ISS early this morning, bringing with it almost 6,500 pounds of cargo to the station.
In addition to cargo for the crew aboard the space station, Dragon will deliver several new experiments, including a project to determine how well Earth-based simulators mimic microgravity conditions, a bone scaffold made from wood that could produce new treatments for fragile bone conditions like osteoporosis, and equipment to help researchers evaluate how red blood cells and the spleen change in space. The Dragon spacecraft also will carry a new instrument to study charged particles around the Earth that can impact power grids and satellites, an investigation that could provide a fundamental understanding of how planets form, and a instrument designed to take highly accurate measurements of sunlight reflected by Earth and the Moon.
It also delivered a French-made spacesuit prototype to be tested by French astronaut Sophie Adenot to see if its design will allow her to get in and out of the suit in under two minutes. Based on what Adenot reports, engineers will use this prototype to develop “a new prototype” for further ground testing. (I wonder if this project is like most European space projects: After this second prototype is tested, they will build a third prototype, followed by a fourth and fifth, with the real article not actually going into operation for decades hence.)
SpaceX today launched an unmanned Dragon freighter to ISS, its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida.
The first stage completed its 6th flight, landing back at Cape Canaveral. The capsule is also making its sixth flight to ISS, and will dock with the station at 7 am (Eastern) on May 17, 2026.
57 SpaceX
27 China
8 Russia
6 Rocket Lab
For the third straight year SpaceX leads the entire world combined in total launches, 57 to 48.
Both SpaceX and China successfully completed launches since yesterday. First, SpaceX launched a new group of satellites for the National Reconnaissance Office, its Falcon 9 lifting off from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California. For security reasons, the number of satellites launched was not revealed.
The first stage completed its 9th flight, landing on a drone ship in the Pacific.
Next China launched another set of Qianfan (SpaceSail) internet satellites into orbit, its Long March 6A rocket lifting off from its Taiyuan spaceport in northeast China. Though China’s state run press did not reveal the number of satellites launched, past Long March 6A launches of this constellation have placed 18 satellites into orbit. If so, there are now 155 Quinfan satellites in space, out of a planned constellation of as many as 10,000. The first phase of the constellation however only requires 648, which China hopes to reach before the end of the year.
The state-run press also did not reveal where the rocket’s lower stages (using very toxic hypergolic fuels) crashed inside China.
The leaders in the 2026 launch race:
56 SpaceX
25 China
8 Russia
6 Rocket Lab
For the third straight year SpaceX leads the entire world combined in total launches, 56 to 46.
SpaceX hopes to complete another launch later today, carrying a Dragon cargo capsule to ISS (on its sixth flight), but weather might force a scrub. UPDATE: Scrubbed due to weather, rescheduled for May 13, 2026.
SpaceX tonight successfully launched another 24 Starlink satellites, its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California.
The first stage completed its 24th flight, landing on a drone ship in the Pacific.
The leaders in the 2026 launch race:
55 SpaceX
23 China
8 Russia
6 Rocket Lab
For the third straight year SpaceX leads the entire world combined in total launches, 55 to 44.
SpaceX at about midnight tonight successfully launched a South Korean Earth imaging satellite as well as 44 other smallsats, its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California. As of posting the satellites had not yet been deployed.
The first stage (B1071) completed its 33rd flight, landing back at Vandenberg, 50 days after its previous flight. With this flight, the booster moves into a third place tie with the Atlantis shuttle shuttle in the rankings of the most reused launch vehicles:
39 Discovery space shuttle
34 Falcon 9 booster B1067
33 Atlantis space shuttle
33 Falcon 9 booster B1071
32 Falcon 9 booster B1063
31 Falcon 9 booster B1069
28 Columbia space shuttle
27 Falcon 9 booster B1077
27 Falcon 9 booster B1078
The leaders in the 2026 launch race:
54 SpaceX
23 China
8 Russia
6 Rocket Lab
For the third straight year SpaceX leads the entire world combined in total launches, 54 to 44.
