A Falcon 9 rocket topped with 23 Starlink craft lifted off from NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida today at 2:42 p.m. EDT (1842 GMT), at the very end of a nearly four-hour window.
The Falcon 9's first stage came back to Earth as planned about 8.5 minutes later, touching down on the droneship A Shortfall of Gravitas, which was stationed in the Atlantic Ocean.
It was the 3rd launch and landing for this particular first stage, according to a SpaceX mission description. The booster had one Starlink mission and the Crew-8 astronaut launch under its belt before today.
The Falcon 9's upper stage, meanwhile, will continue carrying the Starlink satellites to low Earth orbit, where they will be deployed about 65 minutes after liftoff.
Source: www.space.com
No comments:
Post a Comment