SpaceX sends up Space Coast’s 66th launch of the year

SpaceX chalked up another Starlink mission from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station to mark the Space Coast’s 66th launch of the year.

A Falcon 9 with 23 of the company’s Starlink internet satellites lifted off from Canaveral’s Space Launch Complex 40 at 11:20 p.m. Monday.

The booster flew for the 17th time, the third time SpaceX has flown one of its boosters 17 times, although one has flown 18 missions. It landed safely on the droneship Just Read the Instructions downrange in the Atlantic.

This is the fourth month in a row the Space Coast has shoehorned in seven launches in a month, and the fifth time this year, although only the second time SpaceX has been responsible for all seven of those launches in one month.

SpaceX has flown 62 of the 66 Space Coast missions overall, with Relativity Space making its lone launch of its Terran 1 3D-printed rocket back in March, and United Launch Alliance managing one Delta IV Heavy and two Atlas V rocket launches since June.

SpaceX has also flown 25 times from California’s Vandenberg Space Force Station, making this its 87th orbital flight this year, not counting the two failed attempts to launch its Starship and Super Heavy rocket from Texas.

©2023 Orlando Sentinel.
Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.