{"id":225857,"date":"2026-01-03T21:01:10","date_gmt":"2026-01-03T21:01:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/225857\/"},"modified":"2026-01-03T21:01:10","modified_gmt":"2026-01-03T21:01:10","slug":"spacex-launches-italian-earth-observing-satellite-to","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/225857\/","title":{"rendered":"SpaceX launches Italian Earth-observing satellite to\u2026"},"content":{"rendered":"

SpaceX launched the first mission of 2026 tonight (Jan. 2).<\/p>\n

A Falcon 9<\/a> rocket lifted off from Vandenberg Space Force Base<\/a> in California tonight at 9:09 p.m. EST (6:09 p.m. local California time; 0209 GMT on Jan. 3), carrying an Italian Earth-observing satellite to orbit.<\/p>\n

The rocket’s first stage landed back at Vandenberg as planned about 8.5 minutes after liftoff. It was the 21st flight for this particular booster, according to SpaceX<\/a>.<\/p>\n

A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket launches the COSMO-SkyMed Second Generation mission for the Italian Space Agency and the Italian Ministry of Defence from California on Jan. 2, 2026. (Image credit: SpaceX)<\/p>\n

About 4.5 minutes later, the Falcon 9’s second stage deployed the payload \u2014 a COSMO-SkyMed Second Generation satellite \u2014 into low Earth orbit<\/a> for the Italian Space Agency and the Italian Ministry of Defence.<\/p>\n

The spacecraft will study Earth using synthetic aperture radar, gathering data at all times of day and in all weather conditions from an altitude of 385 miles (620 kilometers).<\/p>\n

COSMO-SkyMed Second Generation is a small network designed to “monitor the Earth for the sake of emergency prevention, strategy, scientific and commercial purposes, providing data on a global scale to support a variety of applications,” according to a European Space Agency explainer<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Among those applications are “risk management, cartography, forest & environment protection, natural resources exploration, land management, defense and security, maritime surveillance, food & agriculture management,” the explainer adds.<\/p>\n

Three COSMO-SkyMed Second Generation satellites have now launched to date. The first one flew in December 2019 atop a Soyuz rocket, and the second lifted off in January 2022 on a Falcon 9<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The upper stage of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket deploys a COSMO-SkyMed Second Generation satellite into low Earth orbit for the Italian Space Agency and the Italian Ministry of Defence on Jan. 2, 2026. (Image credit: SpaceX)<\/p>\n

Tonight’s liftoff was the first of 2026 not just for SpaceX<\/a> but for the global launch community.<\/p>\n

It’s no surprise that SpaceX is breaking in the year. Elon Musk’s company launched a whopping 165 orbital missions in 2025<\/a> \u2014 far more than any other entity, either commercial or governmental. That was also a record for SpaceX, which the company may aim to break again this year.<\/p>\n

Editor’s note: This story was updated at 9:25 p.m. ET on Jan. 2 with news of successful launch, rocket landing and satellite deployment.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"SpaceX launched the first mission of 2026 tonight (Jan. 2). A Falcon 9 rocket lifted off from Vandenberg…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":225858,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[2476,3109,3113,61,3107,60,43,3110,3108,3111,82,247,3112,268],"class_list":{"0":"post-225857","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-space","8":"tag-breaking-news","9":"tag-daily-news","10":"tag-global-news","11":"tag-ie","12":"tag-inkl","13":"tag-ireland","14":"tag-news","15":"tag-news-app","16":"tag-news-headlines","17":"tag-news-today","18":"tag-science","19":"tag-space","20":"tag-today-news","21":"tag-world-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225857","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=225857"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/225857\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/225858"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=225857"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=225857"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=225857"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}