The launch of a SpaceX rocket Tuesday night marks the 50th launch from Florida’s Space Coast this year.
The 50th launch sent 22 company’s Starlink satellites into orbit, joining the more than 4,500 already in space, providing broadband internet around the globe. They launched atop a Falcon 9 rocket, lifting off at 11:38 p.m. from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station’s Space Launch Complex 40.
The mission is also the 17th flight for the first stage booster, a record number of reflights as the company works to lower the cost of access to space by reusing parts of the Falcon 9 rocket.
SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket has become a workhorse for the company, launching more than two hundred missions since 2010 from launch pads in Florida and California.
Of the 50 launches this year from the Space Coast, SpaceX has launched all but three, and is on pace to break its 2022 record of 57 launches in a single year.
Next month, the company's Falcon Heavy rocket is set to launch NASA's Psyche mission, sending a probe to a metal-rich asteroid.
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