Another group of SpaceX Starlinks were sent skyward…
On Wednesday, April 7 at 12:34 p.m. EDT, SpaceX launched 60 Starlink satellites from Space Launch Complex 40 (SLC-40) at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida.
About eight minutes after launch, the Falcon 9 booster came back down landing on the “Of Course I Still Love You” droneship in the Atlantic Ocean. The first-stage booster has launched six other times, including on the first SpaceX launch sending astronauts to the International Space Station.
This was the seventh launch and landing of this Falcon 9 first stage booster, which previously launched NASA astronauts Bob Behnken and Doug Hurley to the International Space Station, ANASIS-II, CRS-21, Transporter-1, and two Starlink missions. One half of Falcon 9’s fairing previously supported the AMOS-17 and two Starlink missions, and the other supported one Starlink mission.
“Our drone trips are equivalent in size to a football field, and the landing area that you see right there is approximately 200 feet by 150 feet, that’s big enough that a hockey rink would fit inside that landing area,” SpaceX Dragon engineer Youmei Zhou said during the livestream.