SpaceX just lofted yet another batch of its Starlink broadband satellites to orbit.
A Falcon 9 rocket carrying 24 Starlink craft lifted off from foggy Vandenberg Space Force Base in California today (Sept. 13) at 1:55 p.m. EDT (1755 GMT; 10:55 a.m. local California time).
About 8.5 minutes later, the rocket's first stage touched down in the Pacific Ocean on the SpaceX drone ship "Of Course I Still Love You." It was the 28th launch and landing for this particular booster, which is designated B1071.
NROL-87 | NROL-85 | SARah-1 | SWOT | Transporter-8 | Transporter-9 | Transporter-13 | NROL-146 | Bandwagon-2 | NROL-153 | NROL-192 | 16 Starlink missions
The Falcon 9's upper stage continued hauling the 24 Starlink satellites to low Earth orbit, where they're scheduled to be deployed 62.5 minutes after liftoff.
The new arrivals will join more than 8,300 other active spacecraft in the Starlink network, by far the largest satellite constellation ever assembled.
Today's launch was the 115th Falcon 9 liftoff of the year. More than 70% of these missions have been Starlink flights.
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