28 Starlink satellites lift on 130th mission of SpaceX’s Falcon 9
\nby Chris Benson
\n Washington DC (UPI) Oct 16, 2025 <\/p>\n
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SpaceX set a milestone Thursday morning as it marked the 130th launch of its Falcon 9 rocket.<\/p>\n
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\nThe Falcon 9 that launched 28 Starlink satellites took off at 5:57 a.m. EDT Thursday morning from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida and deployed the devices into low-Earth orbit some 64 minutes after leaving the planet.<\/p>\n
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\nIt represented Falcon 9’s 130th flight of the year, only two short of its 2024 single-year record.<\/p>\n
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\nThe rocket’s first stage returned to Earth slightly less than nine minutes later as planned on SpaceX’s drone ship Just Read The Instructions sitting in the Atlantic Ocean.<\/p>\n
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\nThe B1095-designated rocket booster on the Falcon 9 carried the 28 satellite devices to expand global Internet access by the Elon Musk-owned companies and was this booster’s third launch and landing.<\/p>\n
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\nMore than 70% of Falcon 9 launches this year have supported the expansion of the Starlink network, now numbering nearly 8,600 operational satellites.<\/p>\n
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\nOn Wednesday, Musk’s SpaceX sent a further 21 satellites into orbit from its California base for the U.S. military’s Space Development Agency.<\/p>\n
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