SpaceX and financial company Shift4 have revealed what could become the world’s first private orbital astronaut launch – and two of Crew Dragon’s four seats are up for grabs in a public raffle for charity. The venture has been deemed Inspiration4 and is closely related to the St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital and charity, spearheaded…
While SpaceX technically launched its 1000th Starlink satellite on January 20th, the company’s next launch could give Starlink 1000 working satellites for the first time ever. Pushed from January 27th to no earlier than (NET) Sunday, January 31st by an apparent lack of drone ship availability, SpaceX’s 17th Starlink “v1.0” launch and 18th dedicated mission overall is…
In a bizarre series of events, SpaceX and CEO Elon Musk spent the day visibly clashing with the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) over Starship launch licensing delays. Just six weeks ago, Starship serial number 8 (SN8) nearly aced the SpaceX’s first FAA-approved high-altitude launch debut out of South Texas, demonstrating the rocket’s ability to…
What is arguably the most complex and important part of SpaceX’s Super Heavy booster prototype has made its first appearance at the company’s South Texas Starship factory. Following in the footsteps of Starship development, Super Heavy has been able to extensively borrow from the many lessons learned over the course of building, testing, flying, and…
A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket has successfully delivered 143 spacecraft to orbit, snagging a world record for most satellites launched in one go that’s likely to remain unchallenged indefinitely. Marking the second polar launch from the US East Coast in half a century and SpaceX’s second such launch overall, the Transporter-1 is likely first of…
While delayed from Friday to Saturday, SpaceX’s next Falcon 9 launch still appears to be on track to obliterate the world’s current record for most satellites launched on a single rocket. Currently set at 104 satellites by an Indian PSLV rocket launch in 2017, all signs point to SpaceX beating that record by almost 50% on its…
SpaceX’s reign as the only privately funded American spaceflight company to reach and successfully deploy small satellite payloads into orbit ended on January 21, 2018, when Rocket Lab’s Electron rocket delivered three customer CubeSats to orbit for the first time. SpaceX and Rocket Lab have since been the only private American companies to offer dedicated…
SpaceX has successfully completed the first of dozens of Starlink launches planned in 2021, simultaneously crushing multiple rocket reusability records and completing an “envelope expansion” booster landing at sea. Ending several days of delays, Falcon 9 booster B1051, an expendable upper stage, a flight-proven payload fairing, and 60 new Starlink satellites lifted off at 8:02…
A series of recent Starship and Starlink delays have pushed SpaceX’s Starship flight test and two Falcon 9 launches into the same ~25-hour period, potentially setting the stage for a frenetic Wednesday and Thursday. SpaceX announced a third delay for its Starlink-16 mission late on January 18th, pushing the launch to no earlier than 8:02…
SpaceX is in the midst of preparing for back-to-back Falcon 9 launches from its two Florida pads, a feat that will also require two drone ships for each rocket booster to land on. Drone ship Just Read The Instructions (JRTI) is already on station off the coast of North Carolina for SpaceX’s first Starlink launch…