SpaceX tied its rocket-reuse record on Thursday night (Feb. 22).
A Falcon 9 rocket carrying 22 of SpaceX’s Starlink broadband satellites lifted off from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California on Thursday at 11:11 p.m. EST (8:11 p.m. local California time; 0411 GMT on Feb. 23).
It was the 19th mission for this Falcon 9’s first stage, according to a SpaceX mission description, tying a mark the company set on a Starlink launch this past December.
Related: Starlink satellite train: How to see and track it in the night sky
The Falcon 9’s first stage came back to Earth about 8.5 minutes after liftoff for a landing on the drone ship Of Course I Still Love You, which was stationed in the Pacific Ocean.
The ship will haul the booster back to terra firma for inspection, refurbishment and (quite likely) yet another flight.
The Falcon 9’s upper stage was scheduled to deploy the 22 Starlink satellites into low Earth orbit (LEO) about 62 minutes after liftoff.
Starlink provides internet service to customers around the world. The LEO megaconstellation currently consists of more than 5,400 operational spacecraft, but that number is increasing all the time.
Tonight’s launch will be the 17th of 2024 already for SpaceX. Flight 16 lofted an Indonesian telecom satellite on Tuesday (Feb. 20), on a milestone mission for SpaceX — the 300th successful Falcon 9 launch overall.
