SpaceX launches 51 Starlink satellites into orbit

SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket successfully launched 51 Starlink satellites to low-Earth orbit on Friday, March 3, completing the company's 15th mission so far this year.

The mission lifted off at 10:38 a.m. PT (18:38 UTC) from Space Launch Complex 4 East (SLC-4E) at Vandenberg Space Force Base in California. Following stage separation, the rocket's first stage landed on the "Of Course I Still Love You" droneship stationed in the Pacific Ocean.

The first stage booster supporting this mission previously launched Crew-1, Crew-2, SXM-8, CRS-23, IXPE, Transporter-4, Transporter-5, Globalstar FM15, ISI EROS C-3 and two Starlink missions.

For the unversed, Starlink is a satellite internet constellation consisting of thousands of small satellites in low Earth orbit, which are designed to provide high-speed internet access to people anywhere in the world, especially where traditional internet infrastructure is unavailable, unreliable, or too expensive to install.

Falcon 9 launches Starlink to orbit from California, completing SpaceX's 15th mission so far this year pic.twitter.com/bUt1lpYbct

— SpaceX (@SpaceX) March 3, 2023

SpaceX has had a very busy week with three launches in a row. The first was on February 27, 2023, when the company launched the first batch of 21 second-generation Starlink satellites to low-Earth orbit. The Starlink V2 Mini satellites feature key technologies such as more powerful phased array antennas and the use of E-band for backhaul, allowing the company to provide ~4x more capacity per satellite than previous iterations.

On March 2, 2023, SpaceX launched the Crew-6 mission to the International Space Station. The SpaceX Dragon, named Endeavour, carried NASA astronauts, Mission Commander Stephen Bowen and Pilot Woody Hoburg, along with UAE (United Arab Emirates) astronaut Sultan Alneyadi, and Roscosmos cosmonaut Andrey Fedyaev.

The team is launching on average every 4 days

— SpaceX (@SpaceX) March 3, 2023