In less than a day after launching NASA's Crew 7 mission to the International Space Station (ISS), SpaceX flew its Falcon 9 rocket from the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida. The launch was SpaceX's 59th for 2023 and its 258th overall mission, indicating that it is unlikely that the firm will meet its self-set target of launching 100 rockets this year. SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket was already vertical on the pad yesterday at the time of the Crew 7 launch, and if the company is to launch 100 missions this year, then it will have to launch one more mission this year and at least ten missions per month for the remainder of 2023.
SpaceX Has Launch Nearly As Many Launches In 2023 So Far As It Did In Full Year 2022
Even though SpaceX might not launch 100 missions this year, the firm has grown its launch cadence this year compared to the last. In 2022, the company had launched 61 missions, and with potentially two more launches left before August closes, it appears that SpaceX will have met its 2022 cadence by the end of this month.
A large portion of SpaceX's launch manifest is made of Starlink launches, and recent trends indicate that the firm will have to step up the pace of these launches, too. This is because the number of satellites that SpaceX launches with each mission has rapidly dropped since the firm finished building out the first generation portion of its constellation. The satellites part of the second generation constellation are significantly bigger than their predecessors and naturally take more space inside the Falcon 9 rocket.
SpaceX's plans for its second-generation constellation have penned in using Starship for the launches, and so far, there are few signs that the rocket will be operational by the end of this year.
The Falcon 9 lifted off at 9:05 pm local time and within a minute of the launch, it was traveling faster than the speed of sound. The booster for yesterday's mission was a relatively new one by SpaceX's standards, as it was flying for the third time. It was the booster's first Starlink flight. Before today's mission, the rocket had flown a satellite for the European Space Agency (ESA) and a private astronaut mission for Axiom Space.
SpaceX's Crew Dragon is on its way to the International Space Station (ISS) right now, and it is expected to dock at the station later today. The Crew Dragon is currently flying NASA's Crew 7 mission, and the launch took place yesterday after a day's delay. This delay took place because SpaceX had to verify all of the spaceship's valves due to some problems on a Cargo Dragon that came back to Earth earlier this year. Its journey to the station has been smooth so far, apart from a minor problem with one of its GPS sensors. These sensors are responsible for orienting the ship with the ISS, and more details about this anomaly should be clear once the Dragon approaches the ISS to dock.
SpaceX also conducted a static fire test of the Starship Super Heavy booster earlier this week. This was one of the most successful tests of the rocket so far, as all 33 of its Raptor engines successfully ignited. However, the test, which ran for a full duration of six seconds, still saw two Raptor engines shut down, indicating that SpaceX still faces some problems when handling close to three dozen rocket engines on a single rocket.
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