SpaceX reached a significant milestone in their ambitious internet constellation project when it launched its Starlink satellite into orbit.
Elon Musk’s firm launched another 49 Starlink satellites on a Falcon 9 rocket from Kennedy Space Center, Florida at 21:02 ET Tuesday (02:02 GMT Wednesday).
SpaceX announced on Twitter that the Starlink satellites were deployed approximately an hour and 20 minutes following liftoff.
Starlink has launched 2,042 satellites since February 2018. However, some have failed or were decommissioned.
This image was taken at a slow shutter speed. A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket, launched from Launch Pad 39A, Kennedy Space Center, curves across this night sky view in Viera, Florida. January 18, 2022
Starlink is a constellation of satellites that aims to provide internet access to most of the Earth, particularly underserved rural areas.
Starlink internet, a beta-service, is now available in 23 countries worldwide, including the UK.
Musk believes that the next generation of Starlink constellations will have 42,000 Starlink satellites orbiting low-Earth orbit.
Tuesday’s launch marks the third Falcon 9 blast-off of the year, following a Starlink batch on January 6 and the third Transporter ‘rideshare’ mission on January 13.
SpaceX successfully launched Falcon 9’s second stage aboard one of its drone ships in the Atlantic Ocean. This was referred to as ‘A Shortfall Of Gravitas’. It happened 10 minutes later.
In order to reduce costs, the recovery vessel will catch falling boosters.
SpaceX tweets: “Deployment confirmed of 49 Starlink satellites,” SpaceX tweeted that Falcon 9’s initial stage had landed on A Shortfall of Gravitas’ droneship.
On Tuesday, a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket took off from Pad 39A of Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral Florida. This rocket carried 49 Starlink Satellites
An artist’s rendition of the Starlink satellite. China states that the space station of China had to take twice as many evasive steps to avoid collision threats from satellites.
Musk is also available tweeted a stunning shot of the Falcon 9 rocket silhouetted against the light of the moon, shortly after launch.
Musk provided an update Saturday on how many Starlink satellites are currently active over Earth.
Many of them have stopped functioning and are no longer useful.
Musk stated that there were 1,469 Starlink satellites currently active, and 272 others’moving into operational orbits’ prior to Tuesday’s launch.
Musk said that ‘laser links will activate soon’ to refer to the lasers which route data among satellites within the constellation.
Elon Musk, who is pictured with Elon Musk, believes that next-generation Starlink constellations may have 42,000 Starlink Satellites in low Earth orbit.
SpaceX already has its next batch of Starlink satellites scheduled for launch aboard Falcon 9 on January 29 — the third Starlink launch of 2022.
There were 18 Starlink launches throughout the whole of 2021, totalling the deployment of nearly 1,000 individual satellites in all.
SpaceX’s third Transporter ‘rideshare” mission launched last week. It released 105 nanosatellites, microsatellites, and other information for government and commercial clients.
SpaceX’s rideshare program allows corporations and governments to send a 200-kilogram payload into orbit for the relatively cheap price of $1 million – compared to a solo mission for a $50 million.