On Monday, March 11, Elon Musk’s aerospace company SpaceX successfully launched 46 Starlink internet satellites in low-Earth orbit twice in less than six hours.
The business said in a statement that the satellites were launched from Space Launch Complex 40 (SLC-40) at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida on board its reusable, two-stage Falcon 9 rocket. At 4:35 am (India time) on Monday, the first group of 23 satellites took off.
The first stage booster supporting this mission, which has launched five Starlink flights in addition to Crew-5, GPS III Space Vehicle 06, Inmarsat I6-F2, CRS-28, Intelsat G-37, and NG-20, made its 11th flight today. The first stage of the Falcon 9 returned to Earth and landed vertically on the SpaceX drone ship “Just Read the Instructions,” which was positioned in the Atlantic Ocean, about 8.5 minutes after lift-off.
SpaceX launched twenty-three Starlink broadband satellites last week. With permission to launch up to 12,000 Starlink satellites, the business currently has more than 5,000 operational satellites in space. 22 orbital missions have already been launched by SpaceX this year, and several more are planned: The company plans to launch 144 times in 2024.
