{"id":446099,"date":"2026-02-03T07:05:10","date_gmt":"2026-02-03T07:05:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/446099\/"},"modified":"2026-02-03T07:05:10","modified_gmt":"2026-02-03T07:05:10","slug":"falcon-rocket-carries-starlink-craft-from-vandenberg-sfb-as-spacex-reveals-stargaze-control-system-local-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/446099\/","title":{"rendered":"Falcon Rocket Carries Starlink Craft From Vandenberg SFB as SpaceX Reveals Stargaze Control System | Local News"},"content":{"rendered":"

A Falcon 9 rocket launched another work week Monday at Vandenberg Space Force Base<\/a>, days after SpaceX<\/a> revealed a modern system to keep orbiting satellites safe from crashes.<\/p>\n

The rocket blasted off as the West Coast\u2019s seventh liftoff of the year at 7:47 a.m. from Space Launch Complex-4, followed by the first-stage booster\u2019s landing on the droneship minutes later.\u00a0<\/p>\n

This marked the 31st launch and landing for the first-stage booster tasked with Monday\u2019s mission.<\/p>\n

SpaceX confirmed deployment of the 25 Starlink satellites approximately one hour after liftoff.<\/p>\n

But late Monday afternoon, the firm revealed a glitch involving the second stage although it apparently didn\u2019t affect the delivery of the satellites.<\/p>\n

\u201cTeams are reviewing data to determine root cause and corrective actions before returning to flight,\u201d SpaceX said.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

\t\tA Falcon 9 rocket lifts off Monday morning at Vandenberg Space Force Base to deliver 25 Starlink satellites into orbit. Credit: SpaceX photo<\/p>\n

Last week, the firm revealed the development of its space situational awareness system dubbed Stargaze to serve as sort of an air traffic control for satellites in low-earth orbit.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Stargaze \u201csignificantly enhances the safety and sustainability of satellite operations in low-Earth orbit (LEO),\u202fand \u202fits screening data \u202fwill be made \u202favailable \u202fto the broader satellite operator community free of charge in the coming weeks,\u201d SpaceX said.<\/p>\n

\u201cPractices\u2014such as leaving rocket bodies in LEO, operators maneuvering \u202ftheir satellites \u202fwithout sharing trajectory predictions or coordinating with other active satellites, and\u202f countries \u202fconducting anti-satellite tests\u2014have heightened the risk of collision,\u202f necessitating improvements in\u202fspace-traffic coordination,\u201d SpaceX said in its announcement.<\/p>\n

Conventional methods usually detect objects only a limited number of times per day, creating \u201clarge \u202funcertainties in orbital predictions,\u201d SpaceX said.<\/p>\n

The \u201cvolatile space weather\u201d also hampers efforts to keep satellites safe.<\/p>\n

\u201cStargaze delivers a several-order-of-magnitude increase in detection capability compared to conventional ground-based systems. Stargaze uses data collected from nearly\u202f30,000 star trackers, each\u202f of which makes\u202f continuous observations of nearby objects, resulting in\u202fapproximately 30 million transits detected daily\u202facross the fleet.\u201d<\/p>\n

Stargaze showed off its space traffic safety skills in late December when a Starlink satellite encountered a conjunction, or possible collision, with a third-party satellite which SpaceX didn\u2019t name, performing maneuvers. <\/p>\n

Initially expected to have a close approach of 5.6 miles \u2014considered a safe miss-distance with zero probability of collision \u2014 the maneuver made the miss-distance a mere 197 feet.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Starlink satellite performed a collision avoidance maneuver to reduce the risk, SpaceX said.<\/p>\n

Starlink orbital data is updated and shared\u202f multiple times a day, with SpaceX calling on other operators\u202f to \u202fdo \u202fthe same.\u202f<\/p>\n

\u201cAn appropriate analogy is commercial aviation: there are hundreds of thousands of flights of aircraft daily, but they are able to avoid collisions because they broadcast their location and flight plan to other aircraft. Similarly, spacecraft operators should follow this minimal standard of sharing their predicted trajectory,\u201d SpaceX said.<\/p>\n

\u201cBy providing this ephemeris sharing and conjunction screening service free of charge,\u202fwe hope to\u202fmotivate\u202foperators to take similar steps towards ephemeris sharing and safe flight,\u201d SpaceX added.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The Starlink constellation is one of several megaconstellations already in existence with several others planned for the future by both American firms plus international companies and governments.\u00a0<\/p>\n

SpaceX will conduct another Starlink mission from Vandenberg as soon as Friday. The liftoff, of a Falcon 9 rocket carrying 25 satellites, will occur between 9:05 a.m. and 1:05 p.m.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A Falcon 9 rocket launched another work week Monday at Vandenberg Space Force Base, days after SpaceX revealed…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":446100,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[48],"tags":[983,79,193],"class_list":["post-446099","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-space","tag-local-news","tag-science","tag-space"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/446099","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=446099"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/446099\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/446100"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=446099"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=446099"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=446099"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}