The booster that flew on Tuesday had been used five times before.
SpaceX
SpaceX sent another batch of Starlink Broadband Satellites en route to Orbit of Florida on Tuesday, along with a few Earth-observing metal birds, and made history again in the process.
The Falcon 9 impulse used by Elon Musk’s space company to share the ride had previously flown on three Starlink missions and on two commercial satellite deliveries. That means the flight this week was his sixth, a new mark for a single orbital rocket.
“Some big milestones are coming up,” Musk said on Twitter Sunday, referring to the booster’s sixth flight (serial number B-1049) and the 100th mission for SpaceX on the company’s history.
The first stage of the Falcon 9 actually set two records on the same day, by first launching for the sixth time and then landing for the sixth time a while later.
The launch took place Tuesday morning at 7:31 a.m. PT scheduled from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, and the booster arrived about nine minutes later on the droneship Of Course I Still Love You in the Atlantic Ocean.
In addition to the historic launch and landing, SpaceX managed to capture one half of the nose seal that protected the 58 Starlink satellites and three satellites managed by Earth imagery company Planet, as they jumped through the atmosphere. The fairing half was snagged with a large ship fitted with a net, as seen in the video below. The other half apparently came close in the water.
This fairing pair is also encountered in flight, after being used and recovered on a previous Starlink mission. SpaceX has just recently perfected her method for picking up these parts, and we will see if it can finally make a habit of this and continue to expand its recycling program.
Although officially named Starlink 10, this was actually the 11th launch of a batch of Starlink satellites, after the most recent prior mission on 7 August. The next one this week is set for September, and will be preceded by a Falcon 9 launch in late August of an Argentine satellite that was originally planned for a 2019 lift in 2019.
