Photo: SpaceX (via Elon Musk)
After another successful SpaceX launch, the company’s Starlink satellite constellation has expanded once again.
SpaceX launched another 48 Starlink satellites on Wednesday morning at 8:45 a.m. EST, from Space Launch Complex 40 (SLC-40) at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida. It marked the 41st overall Starlink launch for SpaceX.
The company says this was the fourth launch and landing of this particular Falcon 9 first stage booster B1052; it previously supported missions Arabsat-6A, STP-2, and COSMO-SkyMed Second Generation FM2.
The landing of the Falcon 9 was successful on the drone ship A Shortfall of Gravitas in the Atlantic Ocean.
Check the full reply of the early morning Starlink launch below:
Another 48 Starlinks just reached orbit https://t.co/BLb2x69lvQ
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) March 9, 2022
The news comes just under a week after SpaceX launched another 47 Starlink satellites on March 3, which marked the Falcon 9 booster’s 11th straight landing.
It also comes after SpaceX supplied Ukraine with Starlink internet service and hardware amidst the ongoing Russian invasion.
SpaceX President Gwynne Shotwell said the company’s move into Ukraine was over a month in the making, as it awaited approval from the company’s government.
The approval came on February 26 through a tweet from a Ukrainian Minister asking for the company to provide Starlink internet.
Later that day, Musk tweeted that Starlink service was turned online in Ukraine, with dish interfaces on the way to the country.
Still, Musk has also said that Starlink was the only non-Russian communications system working in certain parts of Ukraine, warning that the hardware would be easily spotted and targeted by Russian aerial forces.
Last week, SpaceX and Musk reprioritized the company to cyber defense and overcoming signal jamming, increasing delays to the company’s Starship launch and Starlink V2.
