SpaceX launched 20 more Starlink broadband satellites from California early Wednesday morning. The rocket carrying the spacecraft lifted off from Vandenberg Space Force Base at 3:01 a.m. EDT. The Falcon 9’s first stage returned to Earth 8.5 minutes after liftoff.
Falcon 9’s first stage booster lands on the Of Course I Still Love You droneship using a single Merlin engine pic.twitter.com/7mWS1efnZh
— SpaceX (@SpaceX) September 25, 2024
It landed on the drone ship “Of Course I Still Love You” in the Pacific Ocean. This marked the 10th launch and landing for this particular booster. The Falcon 9’s upper stage continued powering its way to orbit.
Liftoff of Falcon 9 under the power of nine Merlin engines pic.twitter.com/CGAwMbE8TH
— SpaceX (@SpaceX) September 25, 2024
It is scheduled to deploy the 20 satellites 60 minutes after liftoff. The new additions will join the Starlink megaconstellation, which consists of more than 4,000 operational satellites.
Falcon 9’s successful booster landing
LAUNCH of Starlink Group 9-8 from Vandenberg at 0401 UTC Sep 25
— Jonathan McDowell (@planet4589) September 25, 2024
This launch is part of a typically busy week for SpaceX. On Saturday, the company aims to launch the Crew-9 astronaut mission to the International Space Station for NASA. It will send the mission aloft via a Falcon 9 from Florida’s Cape Canaveral Space Force Station.
Crew-9 will launch with two crewmembers instead of the usual four. It will bring home two people already living on the ISS — NASA’s Suni Williams and Butch Wilmore. They arrived in June aboard Boeing’s Starliner, which suffered thruster issues on its way to the ISS.
Williams and Wilmore will return to Earth along with the Crew-9 astronauts, NASA’s Nick Hague and Aleksandr Gorbunov of Russia’s space agency. They will return aboard the SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule “Freedom” in February 2025.
