SpaceX had a busy week with its Starship rocket’s third test flight and three Falcon 9 missions. On Monday, they launched 22 Starlink satellites from Vandenberg Space Force Base. The Falcon 9 rocket took off on the Starlink 7-16 mission from Space Launch Complex 4 East (SLC-4E) at 7:28 p.m. PT.
The Falcon 9 rocket’s first stage booster, identified as B1075 in SpaceX’s lineup, flew for the 10th time on this mission. It had previously flown twice for the U.S. Space Development Agency and seven times for Starlink missions.
About eight minutes after liftoff, B1075 safely landed on SpaceX’s droneship, ‘Of Course I Still Love You.’ This marked the 86th landing on OCISLY and the 285th successful booster landing by SpaceX.
Meanwhile, SpaceX and NASA are gearing up to launch a Cargo Dragon from Space Launch Complex 40 (SLC-40) at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida. This mission, the 30th under SpaceX’s Commercial Resupply Services (CRS) contract with NASA, will ferry cargo and scientific equipment to the International Space Station.
This mission is noteworthy because it will be the first time a second-generation Dragon spacecraft launches to the International Space Station from SLC-40. The original Dragon capsule first flew aboard the inaugural Falcon 9 rocket in 2010, but operations shifted to pad 39A at Kennedy Space Center after the retirement of the first-generation Dragon following the CRS-20 mission in March 2020.