SpaceX launches more Starlink satellites and grabs rocket payload shroud – Spaceflight Now

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Photo and video images of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket launch on Tuesday show the launcher jumping into space from Cape Canaveral with another batch of nearly 60 Starlink satellites, followed by the successful recovery of the rocket’s first stage thruster and the payload fairing off.

The 229-foot-tall (70-meter) rocket lifted off from Station 40 at Cape Canaveral Air Station at 10:31 a.m. EDT (2:31 p.m. GMT) Tuesday with 58 SpaceX-built Starlink broadband satellites and three satellites from SkySat terrestrial imagery for Planet, a San Francisco-based remote sensing company.

The mission marked the 99th orbital launch attempt in SpaceX history and the 14th SpaceX launch in 2020.

Nine Merlin main engines propelled the Falcon 9 rocket into the sky with 1.7 million pounds of thrust, consuming kerosene and liquid oxygen propellants for two and a half minutes before breaking loose to descend back to Earth for an accurate landing on SpaceX’s drone in the Atlantic Ocean nearly 630 kilometers northeast of Cape Canaveral.

Falcon 9 has landed! The first step has arrived on the deck of SpaceX’s drone in the Atlantic Ocean.

This marks the 58th successful recovery of a Falcon rocket thruster since 2015, and the sixth landing of that particular thruster.https: //t.co/QK0rrmQrAW pic.twitter.com/cEYBEYrAoF

– Spaceflight Now (@SpaceflightNow) Aug 18, 2020

The rocket’s two-piece payload fairing jettisoned moments later, after the Falcon 9’s upper stage engine was ignited. The two shell-shaped fairing halves returned to Earth under pressure. parachutes, and a SpaceX fairing salvage ship grabbed one of the halves with a giant net.

A second fairing salvage boat retrieved the other fairing hull from the sea.

The first stage booster and payload shroud stolen during Tuesday’s mission were reused in previous launches. The booster has made its sixth trip to space and is back on Tuesday.

SpaceX founder Elon Musk shared a video on Twitter showing the payload shroud captured by one of SpaceX’s recovery boats in the Atlantic Ocean on Tuesday. Musk has previously said that a Falcon 9 rocket fairing costs around $ 6 million, and reusing the fairing – like recycling first-stage boosters – allows SpaceX to lower launch costs.