Replace 11:44 a.m. EST (1644 UTC): SpaceX landed the primary stage booster on the droneship.
SpaceX launched its newest batch of Starlink satellites from Vandenberg House Power Base. The Tuesday afternoon mission carried 27 second-generation Starlinks, a brand new document for one of these satellite tv for pc.
Liftoff of the Falcon 9 rocket from House Launch Advanced 4 East (SLC-4E) occurred at 7:45 a.m. PST (10:45 p.m. EST, 1545 UTC). SpaceX needed to stand down from a launch try on Sunday when a aircraft entered the preserve out zone 11 seconds earlier than the deliberate liftoff. It didn’t give a motive for the Monday scrub.
The Falcon 9 first stage booster supporting this mission, tail quantity B1082, launched for a tenth time. SpaceX beforehand used it to fly USSF-62, OneWeb 4 and 7 earlier batches of Starlink satellites.
It’s considered one of 4 boosters nonetheless in use that has solely launched from the West Coast.
A bit greater than eight minutes into the mission, B1082 landed on the SpaceX droneship, ‘Of Course I Nonetheless Love You,’ marking the 117th booster touchdown on OCISLY and the four-hundredth booster touchdown up to now.
The Starlink 11-8 mission despatched extra second-generation satellites into orbit in a single batch than beforehand attainable. In accordance with SpaceX’s 2024 Progress Report, the corporate mentioned it created Starlink V2 Mini Optimized satellites. The corporate mentioned they not solely have new capabilities, however they’re additionally lighter, and due to this fact, extra may be launched at one time. SpaceX mentioned that its latest model of the V2 Mini are 22 p.c lighter than the unique V2 Mini.
“These satellites have a brand new backhaul antenna powered by a SpaceX-designed and constructed twin band chip, referred to as Doppio,” SpaceX wrote. “The satellites have upgraded avionics, propulsion, and energy techniques and are optimized for Falcon 9 to permit as much as 29 satellites to launch on every mission – six extra satellites per launch than the unique V2 Mini design.”
From connecting astronauts in house, to offering high-speed web to greater than 4.6M energetic prospects right here on Earth, the @Starlink staff is laser targeted on increasing protection, growing speeds and reducing latency so we will join as many as attainable world wide pic.twitter.com/twBoSToUsK
— SpaceX (@SpaceX) January 16, 2025
It’s unclear if SpaceX launched any of those new satellites previous to the Starlink 11-8 mission. Beginning at first of 2024, SpaceX was sometimes launching 23 Starlink satellites from Florida and 22 from Vandenberg, that’s when the satellites with Direct to Cell capabilities weren’t onboard.
The Starlink 6-39 mission, which launched on a Falcon 9 from Cape Canaveral House Power Station on Feb. 25, 2024, was the primary to characteristic 24 Starlink V2 Mini satellites, however there was no point out of any of them being optimized.
It wan’t till Nov. 11, 2024, when one other batch of 24 satellites launched, which as soon as once more, passed off at Cape Canaveral. Since then, there have been six extra missions that featured 24 Starlink V2 Mini satellites every.
