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SpaceX plans to launch another big batch of its Starlink internet satellites early Thursday morning (June 22), and you can watch the action live.
A Falcon 9 rocket carrying 47 Starlink spacecraft is scheduled to lift off from California’s Vandenberg Space Force Base on Thursday at 3:19 a.m. EDT (0719 GMT; 12:19 a.m. local time)
Watch it live here at Space.com, courtesy of SpaceX, or directly via the company. Coverage will begin about five minutes before launch.
Related: Starlink satellite train: How to see and track it in the night sky
A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket launches a batch of the company’s Starlink broadband satellites on March 3, 2023. (Image credit: SpaceX)
If all goes according to plan, the Falcon 9’s first stage will return to Earth about eight minutes and 45 seconds after launch. It will alight on the SpaceX droneship Of Course I Still Love You, which will be stationed in the Pacific Ocean.
It will be the third launch and landing for this particular booster, SpaceX wrote in a mission description.
The Falcon 9’s upper stage will continue carrying the 47 Starlink satellites aloft, ultimately deploying them in low Earth orbit about 19 minutes after liftoff.
To date, SpaceX has launched nearly 4,600 Starlink satellites, more than 4,200 of which are currently operational, according to astrophysicist and satellite tracker Jonathan McDowell.
And the broadband megaconstellation will continue to grow far into the future. SpaceX has permission to deploy 12,000 Starlink satellites, and the company has applied for approval to launch another 30,000 spacecraft on top of that.
Thursday’s Starlink mission will be the first of an early-morning spaceflight doubleheader, if all goes according to plan: A United Launch Alliance (ULA) Delta IV Heavy rocket is scheduled to launch a classified satellite for the U.S. National Reconnaissance Office from Florida’s Cape Canaveral Space Force Station just minutes later, at 3:25 a.m. EDT (0725 GMT).
You can watch the Delta IV Heavy liftoff here at Space.com as well, courtesy of ULA.
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Michael Wall is a Senior Space Writer with Space.com and joined the team in 2010. He primarily covers exoplanets, spaceflight and military space, but has been known to dabble in the space art beat. His book about the search for alien life, “Out There,” was published on Nov. 13, 2018. Before becoming a science writer, Michael worked as a herpetologist and wildlife biologist. He has a Ph.D. in evolutionary biology from the University of Sydney, Australia, a bachelor’s degree from the University of Arizona, and a graduate certificate in science writing from the University of California, Santa Cruz. To find out what his latest project is, you can follow Michael on Twitter.
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