SpaceX Falcon 9 Successfully Launched 60 New Starlink Satellites

A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket successfully deployed a new batch of 60 Starlink internet satellites into orbit on Thursday, March 4. Elon Musk's company completed the long-awaited task with a successful landing on a floating platform at sea.

The Falcon 9 rocket took off at 3:24 a.m. ET from NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida, just hours after its Starship concept rocket crashed after performing a high-altitude test flight in Texas.

The booster of the Falcon 9 rocket returned to Earth and landed eight and a half minutes later on SpaceX's drone ship "Of Course I Still Love You," which floats in the Atlantic Ocean a couple of hundred miles offshore.

"This will mark our 75th successful recovery of an orbital class rocket and the eighth recovery of this particular booster," SpaceX Dragon propulsion engineer Youmei Zhou announced during a livestream of the launch.

Although SpaceX depends heavily on its fleet of flight-proven rockets and prefers to recycle its Falcon 9 rocket stages for reuse, the company's primary goal is still to successfully carry a flight's payload to orbit.

How Many Overall SpaceX Starlink Satellites Deployed?

According to Space.com, Thursday's launch was the 109th overall for SpaceX's flagship satellites.

SpaceX Falcon 9 launched the 60 Starlink satellites just over an hour after the launch time.

NASASpacelight.com said the widely awaited launch has already been delayed three times this week, due to an automatic trigger and adverse weather conditions.

This is the company's sixth mission of the year and the company's 20th Starlink mission overall.

According to Fox 35 Orlando, there are currently over 1,200 Starlink satellites in orbit. some of which are no longer operating, making it the world's biggest artificial satellite constellation.

Earlier this year, SpaceX used a preorder reservation scheme to give public members an existing or proposed coverage area access to the satellites.

There will be a lot of missions in the future, as SpaceX's initial Starlink constellation will have 1,440 satellites. However, the firm has applied for permission to build tens of thousands more homes.

SpaceX launched a total of 26 missions in 2020, with 25 of them taking off from Florida. The corporation plans to fire as many as 40 rockets this year from its California and Florida launch sites.

Is SpaceX Expanding Its Megaconstellation?

The corporation unveiled its huge constellation with a single aim in mind: to unite the whole world. SpaceX has planned a fleet of flat-paneled broadband satellites that would orbit above the Earth, providing internet access to people worldwide.

SpaceX has begun accepting preorders for its public launch. Users could register for the service on the website, pay a deposit, and then be alerted when coverage becomes available in their region.

Although the organization conducts a lengthy international and domestic beta-testing process, the rollout is on a first-come, first-served basis.

Musk said on February 22 that the constellation would have active coverage to the majority of the Earth by 2021, and full global coverage by 2022.

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