Area X Falcon 9 rocket launches 23 Starlink satellites from Cape Canaveral – Spaceflight Now

SpaceX launched a Falcon 9 rocket from Cape Canaveral Monday evening after excessive winds saved the rocket grounded final week. Liftoff of the Falcon 9 with 23 Starlink satellites occurred at 11:01 p.m. EST (0401 UTC).

Blustery climate scrubbed a launch try final Tuesday and excessive seas within the restoration zone pressured additional delays for this mission however on Monday the winds had died down and the Falcon 9 lifted off into a cold Florida evening sky.

After lifting off from pad 40 at Cape Canaveral, the Falcon 9 will head south-easterly focusing on an orbit inclined 43 levels to the Equator. Its 9 Merlin 1D engines will hearth for almost two and a half minutes earlier than the primary stage separates from the second stage. The primary-stage booster will proceed downrange to land on the drone ship ‘A Shortfall of Gravitas’ within the Atlantic Ocean, east of the Bahamas.

The Falcon 9 booster for Monday’s Starlink 6-34 mission, tail quantity B1081, was making its third flight. It beforehand flew two missions for NASA carrying Dragon Endurance in August with a four-member crew for the Worldwide Area Station and a Cargo Dragon on an area station resupply mission 32 days in the past in November.

The rocket’s payload fairing halves have been to land on parachutes a little bit additional downrange from the drone ship and be scooped up by the help ship ‘Bob’, named after Crew Dragon Demo-2 astronaut Bob Behnken.

The one vacuum Merlin engine of the second stage fired for about six-minutes to succeed in a parking orbit. After coasting for about 45 minutes, the second-stage engine will re-ignite for a three-second burn to refine the orbit. Deployment of the 23 V2 Mini Starlink satellites adopted one hour and 5 minutes after launch.