SpaceX today successfully placed 28 more Starlink satellites into orbit, its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from Cape Canaveral.
The first stage completed its 19th flight, landing on a droneship in the Atlantic.
The leaders in the 2025 launch race:
39 SpaceX
18 China
5 Rocket Lab
4 Russia
SpaceX now leads the rest of the world in successful launches, 39 to 31.
SpaceX today successfully launched another 27 Starlink satellites, its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from Vandenberg in California.
The first stage completed its fifth flight, landing on a drone ship in the Pacific.
The leaders in the 2025 launch race:
38 SpaceX
18 China
5 Rocket Lab
4 Russia
SpaceX now leads the rest of the world in successful launches, 38 to 31.
SpaceX yesterday successfully placed 28 Starlink satellites into orbit, its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from Cape Canaveral in Florida.
Thank you from several readers for letting me know that I missed it. This was the company’s first of two launches yesterday, the second of which was the Fram2 manned mission. I was so focused on that I missed the first.
The first stage completed its seventeenth flight, landing on a drone ship in the Atlantic.
China in turn today launched a satellite to test new technology for providing the internet from orbit, its Long March 2D rocket lifting off from its Jiuquan spaceport in China’s northwest. Little information was released about the satellite, and no information was released about where the rocket’s lower stages — using very toxic hypergolic fuels — crashed inside China.
The leaders in the 2025 launch race:
37 SpaceX
17 China
5 Rocket Lab
4 Russia
SpaceX now leads the rest of the world in successful launches, 37 to 30.
Since this morning’s launch by Rocket Lab, there have been two more launches. First, SpaceX placed another 27 Starlink satellites into orbit, its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from Vandenberg in California.
The first stage completed its 24th flight, landing on a drone ship in the Pacific. This is presently SpaceX’s second most used booster, exceeded only by one that has flown 26 times.
Next China launched a communications satellite for use by its space station and other government space missions, its Long March 3B rocket lifting off from Xichang spaceport in southwest China. No word on where the rocket’s core stage and four side boosters, all using very toxic hypergolic fuel crashed inside China.
The leaders in the 2025 launch race:
35 SpaceX
15 China
5 Rocket Lab
4 Russia
SpaceX still leads the rest of the world in successfully launches, 35 to 27.
SpaceX today successfully launched another 23 Starlink satellites, its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from Cape Canaveral in Florida.
The first stage completed its nineteenth flight, landing on a drone ship in the Atlantic.
The leaders in the 2025 launch race:
32 SpaceX
13 China
4 Russia
4 Rocket Lab
SpaceX now leads the rest of the world in successfully launches, 32 to 24.
Following SpaceX’s successfully launch of four astronauts to ISS yesterday afternoon, the launch industry upped the pace by completing four more launches in the next few hours, two by SpaceX, one by Rocket Lab, and one by China.
Beginning with SpaceX, it first launched another one of its Transporter missions, carrying about three dozen smallsat payloads, its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from Vandenberg. The first stage completed its thirteenth flight, landing on a drone ship in the Pacific. The two fairings completed their eighth and eleventh flights respectively.
Five hours later the company launched another 23 Starlink satellites, the Falcon 9 lifting off from Cape Canaveral in Florida, with the first stage completing its eighteenth flight, landing on a drone ship in the Atlantic.
Rocket Lab meanwhile successfully placed the first of eight commercial radar satellites into orbit for the Japanese satellite company iQPS, its Electron rocket launching from one of its two launchpads in New Zealand.
China in turn used its Long March 2D rocket to place two satellites into orbit, lifting off from its Jiuquan spaceport in northwest China. Its state-run press provided little information about either satellite. Nor did it provide any information about where the rocket’s lower stages — using very toxic hypergolic fuel — crashed inside China.
The leaders in the 2025 launch race:
31 SpaceX
12 China
3 Russia
3 Rocket Lab
SpaceX still leads the rest of the world in successfully launches, 31 to 22.
SpaceX yesterday attempted two launches from its Florida launchpads, but only got one off. First the company placed another 21 Starlink satellites into orbit, its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from Cape Canaveral. The first stage completed its 22nd flight, landing on a drone ship in the Atlantic.
In the second launch from the Kennedy Space Center, SpaceX had to scrub the launch because of a problem with the hydraulic system operating a support clamp arm. The flight is now rescheduled for no earlier than tomorrow at 7:03 pm (Eastern).
The leaders in the 2025 launch race:
28 SpaceX
11 China
3 Russia
2 Rocket Lab
SpaceX now leads the rest of the world, including American companies, in total launches, 28 to 20.
According to an update on SpaceX’s website, the first stage of the Falcon 9 that launched 21 Starlink satellites (not 23 as initially reported) yesterday was lost shortly after landing.
The first stage booster returned to Earth and landed on the Just Read the Instructions droneship, which was stationed in the Atlantic Ocean ~250 nautical miles off the coast of Florida. Following the successful landing, an off-nominal fire in the aft end of the rocket damaged one of the booster’s landing legs which resulted in it tipping over.
This is only the second time in years that a first stage has been lost in this manner. After the previous occurrence last year during the Biden administration, the FAA grounded all SpaceX launches for several days, an action that indicated clearly an effort to harass the company for political reasons. I will be very surprised if this happens again, with Trump now in office.
After a small negotiating kerfuffle, the executive committee of the Falklands government has now approved a major licensing fee change that will allow SpaceX to offer its Starlink service to island residences.
The Executive Committee (ExCo) of the Falkland Islands Government has officially approved a considerable reduction in the VSAT licence fee – it is “minded” to slash it from £5,400 to just £180 but it will stay at £5,400 until final agreement in ExCo in early May. This decision paves the way for Starlink to begin providing services in the Falkland Islands, creating a game-changing step towards modernising the Islands’ telecommunications.
It appears that getting this approval required a major grassroots effort, as the government had initially been reluctant to change anything, despite the fact that numerous people were already using Starlink terminals illegally because there were no other options for good internet access, especially because the government’s deal with OneWeb had produced no results.
Two more launches today. First, Russia launched a Glonass GPS-type satellite, its Soyuz-2 rocket lifting off from its Plesetsk spaceport in northern Russia. The rocket’s core stage, four strap-on boosters and upper stage all landed in planned zones within Russia. Whether they crashed near homes is unknown.
Next SpaceX launched another 23 Starlink satellites, its Falcon 9 rocket lifting off from Cape Canaveral in Florida. The first stage completed its fifth flight, landing on a drone ship in the Atlantic.
Note that though some launch sites indicate China also did a launch this weekend of the solid-fueled Kuaizhou-1A rocket built by the pseudo-company Expace, a translation of this French site indicates the launch was a failure.
The leaders in the 2025 launch race:
26 SpaceX
9 China
3 Russia
2 Rocket Lab
In a series of statements in the last few days Elon Musk has claimed that the $2.4 billion upgrade of the FAA’s air traffic system by Verizon is failing, and further suggested, in a proposal fraught with conflict-of-interest issues, that SpaceX take over the contract instead.
The CNN article that I link to above is surprisingly well written. It describes the situation fairly, and includes no slanderous asides on Musk or SpaceX, as I have found typical of almost every other article written by the propaganda press about this particular subject (or any about Musk).
If Musk says Verizon’s upgrade is failing, I would tend to believe him. That Verizon has barely begun work installing the upgrades, two years after winning the contract, reinforces his accusations. SpaceX has already provided the FAA at no cost three Starlink terminals for testing, and if it does get the job we can be sure the upgrade would be installed far quicker than this.
The conflict-of-interest issue however remains. I am not sure how, or even if, Musk or SpaceX can get around it.
Since my last launch report yesterday there have been two more launches (with another planned for later today).
First, last night SpaceX launched another 21 Starlink satellites into orbit, its Falcon 9 rocket — using a new first stage — lifting off from Cape Canaveral in Florida. The first stage successfully landed on a drone ship in the Atlantic. This new stage shows that SpaceX appears building about one to two new first stages per year in order to maintain its fleet.
Next, China placed two classified remote sensing satellites into orbit, its Long March 2C rocket lifting off from its Jiuquan spaceport in the northwest of China. No word on where the rocket’s first stage, which uses very toxic hypergolic fuel, crashed inside China.
Another launch is expected later this afternoon, by Russia, launching a new Progress freighter to ISS.
The leaders in the 2025 launch race:
25 SpaceX
9 China
2 Rocket Lab
