SpaceX has launched its first dedicated rideshare mission with ten Starlink satellites for polar orbit recently approved by the FCC.
At 10:00 EST today Space Exploration Technologies Corp. (SpaceX) successfully launched its first satellite ridesharing mission of 2021. Dubbed as the Transporter-1, the mission took a staggering 143 small satellites to orbit, setting a new record in the process for the most satellites launched simultaneously. Propelling the Transporter-1 payload is SpaceX’s Falcon 9 Block 5 B1058 booster, which is on its fifth flight and it is the same booster that carried the National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s (NASA) astronauts Col. Robert Behnken and Douglas Hurley to the International Space Station (ISS) for the space agency’s Dragon DM-2 mission that evaluated SpaceX’s Crew Dragon capsule for future missions.7:39 Today’s launch came as SpaceX scrubbed its launch attempt yesterday due to surface electrical fields being unfavorable. While Andy Tran, production supervisor at SpaceX announced the abort six and a half minutes prior to liftoff, the Falcon 9 continued its propellant loading before flight controllers officially held the launch one minute before yesterday’s liftoff time of 09:40 EST. Elon Musk Fights For Gas Wells In Texas To Drill Fuel For Mars Rockets Onboard the Falcon 9 are payloads from Starlink, Kepler, NASA, Swarm Technologies, Spire Global and ICEYE.
