Spacex Launch Today: 24 Starlink satellites target Vandenberg liftoff
SpaceX launch today centers on Starlink 17-42, a Falcon 9 mission carrying 24 broadband internet satellites from Vandenberg Space Force Base Tuesday night. Liftoff from Space Launch Complex 4 East is scheduled for 7:46 p.m. PDT, or 10:46 p.m. EDT.
The mission will add 24 spacecraft to a Starlink constellation that already includes more than 10,000 spacecraft. More than 600 of those satellites support direct-to-device capabilities, and SpaceX is using the Falcon 9 first stage booster B1103 for its second flight.
Vandenberg Space Launch Complex 4 East
SpaceX will send the rocket south-southwesterly after leaving the pad. The launch comes from Space Launch Complex 4 East at Vandenberg Space Force Base, and the timing puts the mission squarely in Tuesday night’s launch window for viewers tracking the flight from the West Coast or on Eastern time.
B1103 previously flew Starlink 17-35 on April 6. For this mission, SpaceX plans to land the booster a little more than eight minutes after liftoff on the drone ship Of Course I Still Love You.
Booster B1103 returns
If the landing succeeds, it will be the 197th landing on Of Course I Still Love You and the 612th booster landing to date. That reuse is part of the operational pattern at the center of this launch: SpaceX is flying a booster that has already completed one Starlink mission and was once assigned to NROL-172 before being swapped for B1097.
Spaceflight Now will carry live coverage beginning about 30 minutes before liftoff. For anyone following the mission, the key details are already set: 24 satellites, a Falcon 9 from Vandenberg, and a launch time of 7:46 p.m. PDT.
SpaceX flight cadence
The company’s launch tempo has remained high. A Falcon 9 launcher also boosted a 4.7-ton military-grade communications satellite for SES and the Luxembourg government from Florida’s Space Coast in a late-afternoon launch Tuesday, and the Starlink 10-34 mission later became SpaceX’s 80th Falcon 9 launch of the year.
That sequence leaves Starlink 17-42 as the next mission on the schedule from Vandenberg, with the booster, payload, and liftoff time already identified for viewers and launch watchers.
