The Falcon 9 heavy launch vehicle launched into orbit with another batch of 53 mini-satellites to replenish the orbital group of the Starlink global internet coverage network.
About this reported development company SpaceX.
The launch was carried out at 00:42 EST (06:42 Kyiv time) from the 40th launch complex at the Cape Canaveral Spaceport in Florida.
This is the 42nd launch of a group of Internet satellites into orbit since May 2019 as part of the Starlink project, and the 3rd in March.
Starlink Internet satellites weighing 290 kg each will be part of the SpaceX orbital group, which already has more than 2,200 spacecraft. Currently, the company is the largest satellite operator in the world.
About an hour after launch, 53 satellites will separate from the second stage of the rocket in a transitional elliptical orbit up to 340 km high. After the SpaceX engineers have checked their performance, the satellites using their own ion engines will rise to a regular orbit with a height of about 540 km.