Elon Musk’s SpaceX breaks a major record for rocket launches
ELON Musk has a launch he'll remember after his Falcon 9 rocket blasted off from Vandenberg Space Force Base early on Friday afternoon.
The launch marks a special occasion in the company's history and symbolizes its amazing progress in spaceflight over recent years.
The launch was SpaceX's 32nd of 2022 and the company has broken its own record for most launches in one year.
SpaceX has more than 30 launches planned between now and the end of the year, enough to shatter the company's previous record.
The Falcon 9 ferrying 46 Starlink satellites to space was supposed to take off on Thursday but the launch was aborted at T-46 seconds.
The rocket launched this afternoon, successfully separated from its booster, and deposited satellites in low Earth orbit less than two hours after taking off.
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The company is creating a new high-water mark for reusability in space travel.
Only used in launches this year were brand new - the other payloads were delivered with previously flown rockets.
The Falcon 9 first-stage booster used in today's launch has lifted off on three other occasions, including a mission on contract for the just one month ago.
Even before today's deposit, Starlink had more than 2,500 satellites in low Earth orbit.
Starlink recently from the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to beam their internet-from-space into moving vehicles and scuttled Dish Network's request to use a Starlink frequency.
It appears Musk's relationship with the FCC is much more solid than with other regulatory agencies.
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Musk and Starlink rode a wave of admiration after the billionaire fast-tracked the internet terminals to Ukraine at the start of the conflict with Russia.
Musk's public image fortunes have reversed as blowback for pulling out of his bid to buy Twitter but SpaceX is reliably impressing by averaging more than one launch every week.