![]() ![]() The FCC previously authorized SpaceX to launch and operate roughly 4,400 first-generation Ka-band and Ku-band Starlink spacecraft that SpaceX has been launching since 2019. The Starlink 5-9 mission Sunday targeted the 43-degree inclination orbit in the Starlink Gen2 constellation. Specifically, the FCC granted SpaceX authority to launch the initial block of 7,500 Starlink Gen2 satellites into orbits at 525, 530, and 535 kilometers, with inclinations of 53, 43, and 33 degrees, respectively, using Ku-band and Ka-band frequencies. ![]() The regulatory agency deferred a decision on the remaining satellites SpaceX proposed for Gen2. 1 to launch up to 7,500 of its planned 29,988-spacecraft Starlink Gen2 constellation, which will spread out into slightly different orbits than the original Starlink fleet. The Federal Communications granted SpaceX approval Dec. ![]() The Starship has nearly 10 times the payload lift capability of a Falcon 9 rocket, with greater volume for satellites, too. The Starlink V2s will be capable of transmitting signals directly to cell phones. But with the Starship rocket still in its test flight phase, SpaceX began launching the Gen2 satellites on Falcon 9 rockets and developed the V2 Minis to fit on the company’s existing launch vehicles. The Starlink V2 Mini satellites that SpaceX started launching in February represent an intermediate step between the smaller Starlink V1.5 spacecraft and the even larger full-size Starlink V2s, which SpaceX plans to deploy in orbit using the company’s new Starship mega-rocket. SpaceX began launching satellites into the Gen2 network in December, beginning the population of new orbital planes with older-design satellites until the larger Starlink spacecraft design is ready to take over entirely. The Starlink V1.5 satellites on Sunday’s Starlink 5-9 mission were similar to the Starlink spacecraft SpaceX has launched over the last few years, but they headed into an orbital plane that is, at least in regulatory terms, part of SpaceX’s second-generation, or Gen2, network. Credit: Michael Cain / Spaceflight Now / Coldlife Photography Liftoff of SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket on the Starlink 5-9 mission. They also have two solar arrays, compared to a single extendable solar panel on each Starlink V1.5 spacecraft. The new Starlink V2 Minis carry upgraded phase array antennas and a more efficient, higher-thrust argon-fueled electric propulsion system. Some of the Starlink V2 Minis appear to be maneuvering to different positions in the Starlink constellation, presumably to begin commercial internet service, according to McDowell’s website. A few spacecraft in the first batch of Starlink V2 Mini satellites were de-orbited, and SpaceX has held back others from entering operational service. 27 on a Falcon 9 rocket, but some of the satellites ran into problems after arriving in space. The first 21 Starlink V2 Mini satellites launched Feb. The new satellites, known as the Starlink V2 Mini design, are larger and offer four times the broadband capacity of the older-design satellites. Sunday’s mission continued deploying SpaceX’s older-generation Starlink V1.5 satellites, after two launches earlier this year started placing a new generation of Starlink satellites in orbit. The rest of the Starlink satellites were prototypes or failed platforms that have been retired from service and guided back into the atmosphere to burn up on re-entry. SpaceX currently has more than 4,000 functioning Starlink satellites in space, with more than 3,400 operational spacecraft and nearly 500 moving into their operational orbits, according to a tabulation by Jonathan McDowell, an expert tracker of spaceflight activity and an astronomer at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. After the Starlink 5-9 launch, SpaceX has sent 4,447 Starlink satellites into orbit The batch of 56 Starlink satellites tied the record for the heaviest payload ever launched by a SpaceX rocket, matching the figure on four previous Falcon 9 missions with a full load of Starlink spacecraft. SpaceX says each Starlink launch adds more than a terabit per second of capacity to the constellation. With Sunday’s launch, half of SpaceX’s 32 launches so far this year have been flights primarily dedicated to the Starlink broadband network, which provides high-speed, low-latency connectivity to customers around the world. The mission was numbered Starlink 5-9 in SpaceX’s launch sequence. EDT (0503:30 UTC) from Pad 40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. A little more than an hour later, the Falcon 9’s upper stage released the 56 Starlink internet satellites into orbit a few hundred miles above Earth. The 229-foot-tall (70-meter) Falcon 9 rocket took off at 1:03:30 a.m. Fifty-six more Starlink internet satellites lifted off early Sunday atop a Falcon 9 rocket from Cape Canaveral on SpaceX’s 32nd launch of the year. ![]()
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