SpaceX launched a new batch of Starlink satellites into orbit from its West Coast launch site on Thursday (Sept. 12).
A Falcon 9 rocket carrying 21 Starlink internet satellites soared into space from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California at 9:45 p.m. EDT (0145 GMT Friday, Sept. 13 or 6:45 p.m. local time).
The first stage for the SpaceX booster than landed on the company drone ship “Of Course I Still Love You” in the Pacific Ocean about eight minutes after launch.
Related: Starlink satellite train: How to see and track it in the night sky
It was the 18th time this first-stage booster has flown to space and back again, with 11 of those missions alone supporting previous Starlink deployments, according to SpaceX records.
Some other SpaceX missions for this booster have included a couple of Transporter launches, which send satellites for multiple clients to space at the same time, as well as national security missions for the National Reconnaissance Office.
More than 6,300 Starlink satellites are operational in orbit, according to Jonathan McDowell, an astronomer at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics who also keeps track of space launches.
SpaceX has been launching frequently in recent days, including sending five BlueBird smartphone satellites to orbit for AST SpaceMobile earlier in the day on Wednesday, and the crewed Polaris Dawn private mission on Tuesday (Sept. 10). SpaceX has launched more than 90 missions to space in 2024, according to media reports.
