SpaceX lines up satellite launch from Cape Canaveral

SpaceX is set to send up the 11th launch from the Space Coast this afternoon with a Falcon 9 from Cape Canaveral Space Force Base.

Liftoff is slated for 3:11 p.m. during a two-hour window from Canaveral’s Space Launch Complex 40. The rocket’s payload is the Merah Putih 2 satellite for Telkom Indonesia, which is headed for a geosynchronous transfer orbit. A backup opportunity is available Wednesday with a four-hour window opening at 12:53 p.m.

Space Launch Delta 45’s weather squadron forecasts a greater than 95% chance for good conditions.

This is the 17th launch of the first stage booster, and SpaceX will attempt its recovery landing downrange on the Just Read the Instructions droneship in the Atlantic Ocean. One of the most flown of SpaceX’s boosters, it previously launched the Crew-3 and Crew-4 human spaceflight missions among others.

SpaceX has flown all but one of the launches from the Space Coast so far in 2023 with United Launch Alliance’s Vulcan Centaur having flown the other.

Elon Musk’s company has also flown six missions from California so far this year, so this flight will make it 16 across its three launch pads on both coasts as part of a year that could see as many as 150 launches, according to Musk.

That doesn’t include test launches from Texas of its in-development Starship and Super Heavy, which is gearing up for its third attempt at a successful suborbital launch as early as next month.

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