SpaceX launch tonight: Everything to know about the Starlink launch from Cape Canaveral

It's launch day!

SpaceX is targeting a 4½-hour window — extending from 11 p.m. to 3:31 a.m. EST Saturday — to launch a Falcon 9 rocket from Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, a Federal Aviation Administration navigational warning shows.

What's more, tonight's liftoff will mark the record-extending 70th orbital launch this year from the Cape Canaveral military facility and NASA's Kennedy Space Center next door.

The SpaceX Falcon 9 will deploy a batch of Starlink internet satellites, which are packed inside the fairing atop the 230-foot rocket. No local sonic booms are expected.

After soaring skyward along a southeastern trajectory, the rocket's first-stage booster will target landing aboard a drone ship out on the Atlantic Ocean 8½ minutes after liftoff.

The Space Force's 45th Weather Squadron forecasts a 70% chance of "go for launch" weather early during tonight's launch window, decreasing to 60% by the end of the window.

Quelle: Florida Today

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Update: 23.12.2023

STARLINK MISSION

On Saturday, December 23 at 12:33 a.m. ET, Falcon 9 launched 23 Starlink satellites to low-Earth orbit from Space Launch Complex 40 (SLC-40) at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida.

This was the 19th flight for the first stage booster supporting this mission, which previously launched Crew Demo-2, ANASIS-11, CRS-21, Transporter-1, Transporter-3, and now 14 Starlink missions.