SpaceX launches 2 Falcon 9 rockets from Florida

Nov. 15 (UPI) — SpaceX launched two rockets with a total of 58 Starlink internet satellites about 3 1/2 hoWe parted ways Saturday night in the fastest turnaround of private enterprise since Florida’s Space Coast.

In total, there have been a record 98 missions this year from the adjacent Kennedy Space Center or the Cape Canaveral space station. The record of 94 was broken on Monday.

The lead time was originally supposed to be 48 minutes, but the second launch was delayed by 2 hours and 49 minutes.

The two launches took place at 10:08 p.m. EST Friday and 1:44 a.m. Saturday – separated by three hours and 36 minutes – surpassing the double turnaround time of 4 hours and 12 minutes achieved by SpaceX in March 2023. The launches took place under clear skies, Florida Today reported.

In 1966, NASA launched two spacecraft 1 hour and 37 minutes apart in Florida with the crew of Gemini 11 and its Agena target vehicle, which was used to practice space rendezvous and orbital docking techniques.

This isn’t SpaceX’s fastest doubleheader, but the other one happened in different states.

On August 31, 2024, two Falcon 9 missions were only 65 minutes apart. One took off from Cape Canaveral and the other from Vandenberg Space Station in California.

The first two stages in Florida landed on droneships in the Atlantic, east of the Bahamas.

The first Falcon 9 took off from Pad 39A at the Kennedy Space Center. The Falcon 9 first stage landed in the Atlantic Ocean on dThe spacecraft “A Shortfall of Gravitas” approximately 8.5 minutes after liftoff. This was the eighth mission of the first stage.

The second Falcon 9 took off from Pad 40 at Cape Canaveral. About 8 and a half minutes later, the first stage landed on the “Read the Instructions” drone and was the 24th mission, including Crew-6.

The first stage rockets are refurbished at Hangar X.

“Less than 10 years ago, the idea of ​​recovering a first stage was extremely controversial,” said Andy Lapsa, CEO and co-founder of Stoke Space, in an article on X. “Now it is absurd to consider anything else.

“Today, the same skepticism surrounds second-stage reuse, but it won’t be long before that too becomes archaic.”

He shared video footage of Blue Origin’s New Glenn booster landing on Thursday.

The New Glenn launch was part of a doubleheader at Cape Canaveral, spaced 6 hours and 9 minutes apart.

The New Glenn rocket deployed NASA’s Mars-bound ESCAPADE spacecraft into low Earth orbit at 3:55 p.m. Then at 10:04 p.m., United Launch Alliance sent up an Atlas V rocket, deploying a Viasat communications satellite.

With both launches, there is are now more more than 8,900 operational Starlink satellites.

The next mission from Florida is scheduled for Tuesday with a launch window of 6:29 p.m. to 10:29 p.m. from Pad 40 at Cape Canaveral.