SpaceX Delivers 131 Satellites to Orbit in One Swoop
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SpaceX Delivers 131 Satellites to Orbit in One Swoop

Elon Musk is confidently moving towards his goal of filling the orbit with satellites to provide the planet with stable internet communications. This time, the Falcon 9 rocket delivered 131 devices into space. The launch was made from the Vandenburg facility, a launch pad in California belonging to the US Space Force.


The rocket's launch block landed seven minutes and thirty-two seconds after liftoff, as planned, in the LZ-4 zone, located almost in the same place from where the carrier was launched. This flight was already the second for this stage, and for Falcon 9, this is the 397th successful return. The number of equipment sent into orbit is not a record: at the beginning of 2021, Falcon 9 put 143 satellites into orbit. This is SpaceX's highest achievement in terms of the number of devices delivered into space.

SpaceX Delivers 131 Satellites to Orbit in One SwoopSeparation of the first stage from the rocket with the 131st satellite (live broadcast). Photo: youtube.com

Of course, not all the satellites that were stuffed into the rocket belong to SpaceX. Thirty-seven of them are owned by Planet, a San Francisco company. It owns three constellations of satellites that probe the planet. Of these 36, 37 are CubeSat SuperDove. This means that their dimensions are roughly the size of a shoebox.

However, the rocket also had a larger satellite on board – Pelican-2. It is designed to detect various objects on Earth, classify plants and crops, and natural disasters. Moreover, all this will be done using AI – artificial intelligence. It is necessary to transmit the received information to the ground station as quickly as possible – practically online, without delays.

Return of the first stage to Earth. Photo: youtube.com

The launch of Falcon 9 with 131 spacecraft was carried out in accordance with the Transporter 12 mission. It allows owners of small satellites to use regularly scheduled Falcon launches to send their equipment into sun-synchronous orbit. The mass of the payload should not exceed fifty kilograms. The price of the issue is 300 thousand dollars for one object sent into space.

In 2021, out of a record 143 satellites launched, 10 belonged to SpaceX and were sent into orbit in the Starlink system. It is worth assuming that the current launch also involves devices for creating a global network. Let us remind readers: Elon Musk has already launched more than 5 thousand satellites into space. And their delivery to orbit is not always safe for civilians aircraft - we already talked about this toldBy 2027, the number of Starlink system devices should reach the planned 20 thousand units.
What do you think about launching 131 satellites at once?
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