SpaceX simply launched one other large fleet of satellites to the ultimate frontier.
A Falcon 9 rocket carrying 70 payloads for a wide range of prospects lifted off from California’s Vandenberg Space Force Base at this time (June 23) at 5:25 p.m. EDT (2125 GMT; 2:25 p.m. native California time), on a rideshare mission often called Transporter 14.
Transporter 14 is lofting microsats, cubesats and reentry capsules, together with one which’s carrying cremated stays and human DNA on a memorial mission.
The Falcon 9’s first stage got here again to Earth at this time as deliberate, touching down on the SpaceX drone ship “Of Course I Nonetheless Love You” within the Pacific Ocean about 8.5 minutes after liftoff.
It was the twenty sixth launch and touchdown for this specific booster, in keeping with a SpaceX mission description. That is near the corporate’s reusability report, which at the moment stands at 28 flights.
The rocket’s higher stage, in the meantime, continued powering its method to low Earth orbit, the place it has a variety of work to do: It’ll deploy the menagerie of payloads over an almost two-hour span that begins roughly 54 minutes after launch.
These payloads embrace non-public Earth-observing satellites, resembling Capella Area’s Capella-17 artificial aperture radar craft, and Starfish Area’s Otter Pup 2, which can try to carry out the first-ever business docking in LEO later this yr.
Transporter 14 can also be carrying the fourth reentry capsule for California firm Varda Space, which is working to fabricate prescription drugs and different items in house and return them to Earth.
Additionally aboard the Falcon 9 higher stage is The Exploration Firm’s new Nyx reusable spacecraft, which is flying a memorial mission in cooperation with the space-burial firm Celestis.
Nyx — the ultimate payload to be deployed at this time — is carrying cremated stays and/or DNA from about 150 folks. If all goes to plan, the spacecraft will circle Earth two or thrice after which be recovered.
As its title suggests, Transporter 14 is the 14th mission in SpaceX’s rideshare sequence. The primary of those, Transporter 1 again in January 2021, set a single-launch report, sending a whopping 143 satellites to orbit.
The corporate additionally operates one other rideshare program known as Bandwagon, which has three missions beneath its belt up to now.