SpaceX
SpaceX’s Falcon 9 Block 5 set for first Cargo Dragon spacecraft launch
After a slight 24-hour delay at NASA’s request, SpaceX is ready to support Falcon 9 Block 5’s first launch of Cargo Dragon and the company’s 16th operational mission to resupply the International Space Station (ISS).
Carrying just under 2600 kg (5700 lbs) of science experiments, ISS hardware, and replenishable goods, CRS-16 will be the fifth time SpaceX has reused a Cargo Dragon capsule that has already been to orbit, with this particular capsule having launched in February and reentered in March of 2017.
To allow for time to replace parts of an @ISS_Research experiment, the launch of the @SpaceX cargo resupply mission to the International @Space_Station is now targeted for 1:16pm ET on Wed., Dec. 5. Details: https://t.co/EvShjud5ws pic.twitter.com/4Ug8xmfs69
— NASA (@NASA) December 4, 2018
Aside from being the first NASA-certified launch of SpaceX’s recent Block 5 upgrade to the Falcon rocket family, CRS-16 will become the first attempted East Coast land-landing of a Falcon 9 Block 5 booster, hopefully seeing B1050 safely recovered at one of the company’s two Landing Zones (LZ-1 or LZ-2) on the Florida coast. Above all else, this type of landing – known as a Return To Launch Site (RTLS) recovery – indicates that Falcon 9 is able to fly a fairly gentle launch and reentry trajectory, owing to a combination of a light payload and low-energy target orbit. As such, B1050 could be a prime candidate to break SpaceX’s launch turnaround record of 72 days – the new Block 5 booster will be subjected to one of the upgraded rocket’s gentlest landings yet.
2018 has been a landmark year for SpaceX’s program of Falcon 9 reusability, evidenced by the fact that a full 60% of the company’s 19 (20 if CRS-16 is a success) launches have flown on or with flight proven boosters. That impressive ratio is likely to only grow further as we head into 2019, to the extent that – by 2020 – the launch of a new Falcon 9 or Falcon Heavy booster could be downright rare.
On the Dragon side of things, SpaceX completed the last launch of a wholly new Cargo Dragon in August 2017, nearly 16 months ago. Since then, all Cargo Dragon launches have featured refurbished capsules, although the spacecraft’s trunk section – featuring some propellant, solar arrays, and storage space – is expended after each mission and must thus be replaced. As of now, SpaceX has only one or two flightworthy Cargo Dragons left that have completed fewer than two trips to orbit and back, meaning that a minimum of two of the company’s remaining CRS-1 missions (CRS-17 through 20) will have to be their given capsule’s third orbital launch. Thankfully, Cargo Dragon has long been designed for three launches per capsule lifetime.
The first of those third orbital reflights will almost certainly kick off sometime next year. In the meantime, SpaceX’s CRS-16 launch will be livestreamed as usual and can be viewed here, beginning later today around 10am PST (1pm EST, 18:00 UTC).
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- A Cargo Dragon nears the ISS. (Oleg Artemyev)
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- A reused orbital spacecraft, Cargo Dragon, back on Earth after its second successful resupply mission. (SpaceX)
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- SpaceX’s LZ-1 pad just after a Falcon 9 landing. Note the black, radar-reflective paint. (SpaceX)
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Elon Musk put a number on where he thinks SpaceX’s Starship program is headed by 2030, replying on X a day after President Trump signed a memo pushing the country toward 1,000 space launches and reentries a year.
The exchange started when Aaron Burnett, co-founder of propulsion startup Mach 33, posted that “1,000 launches/reentries is the goal,” quoting White House science adviser Michael Kratsios on the newly signed National Space Transportation Policy. Burnett noted that the FAA’s own bull-case forecast reached only 385 annual launches by 2030, while his firm’s conservative model already put SpaceX alone near 940. Musk responded, “We’re aiming to reach 30+ Starship launches/day in 2030, which is ~10k annualized. Still tiny numbers compared to airplane flights!”
We’re aiming to reach 30+ Starship launches/day in 2030, which is ~10k annualized.
Still tiny numbers compared to airplane flights!
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) August 21, 2026
That figure is specific to Starship, the rocket SpaceX is still developing for orbital and lunar missions, not the Falcon 9 fleet that carries most of the company’s current launch volume. Starship has flown twice this year, a slower pace than the four and five flights SpaceX managed in 2024 and 2025. Getting from two flights a year to 30 a day is the scale of jump the new federal policy is meant to clear regulatory room for.
Trump’s memo, signed Thursday, directs agencies to identify new launch and reentry sites on federal land, including a new reentry site within 90 days, and to speed up the permitting and environmental reviews that have long slowed cadence growth. It also sets a goal of returning American astronauts to the moon by 2028 and placing initial lunar base elements by 2030, tying the launch buildout directly to NASA’s Artemis program.
SpaceX has already been pushing the FAA toward higher numbers on its own. The agency approved up to 44 annual Starship launches from Kennedy Space Center in February, on top of a 2024 review that raised the cap at Starbase in Texas to 25 a year. Those approvals cover a fraction of the 10,000 annual flights Musk is now describing, which shows how far current permitting still sits from the administration’s stated target.
The near-term test of all this is more modest. SpaceX cleared a full-duration, six-engine static fire on its next Starship vehicle this week, the last major hardware checkpoint before Flight 14, which is targeting no earlier than August 28 and is expected to attempt the vehicle’s first full orbital mission. Musk said last week that a tower catch of the upper stage is still probably months away, a reminder that the immediate roadmap remains far more incremental than the daily launch numbers he just posted.
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SpaceX CEO Elon Musk announced today that the company will likely attempt to catch the Starship upper stage with its launch tower arms “in a few months.”
In a post on X, Musk wrote, “Looks like we will probably catch the ship with the tower in a few months. If there had been a tower out to sea where we practiced landing the ship, it would have been caught.” He added that the first reflight of a Starship vehicle is expected by the end of 2026 or early 2027, describing it as “a fork in the road of history for consciousness reaching the stars.”
Looks like we will probably catch the ship with the tower in a few months. If there had been a tower out to sea where we practiced landing the ship, it would have been caught.
First reflight of the ship will be either end of this year or early next. That will be a fork in the… https://t.co/O5g9pqrzyo
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) August 20, 2026
Musk’s prediction comes amid ongoing progress toward full reusability of the Starship system, a two-stage rocket designed for rapid turnaround and dramatically lower launch costs. Catching the upper stage, known simply as “ship,” with the Mechazilla tower’s mechanical arms would mark a major milestone. It would allow both stages to return directly to the launch site for quick refurbishment and reuse, eliminating the need for ocean recovery.
Musk has previously signaled plans for a ship catch. In July, shortly after SpaceX’s wildly successful Starship 13 mission, he stated that the company would attempt to catch the ship with the tower on the next flight unless problems emerged in the mission data review. Earlier comments also outline conditions such as successful soft ocean landings before attempting a land recovery to minimize risk.
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The latest update from Musk adjusts this timeline to a few months, reflecting the iterative nature of the test campaign.
SpaceX has already demonstrated the tower catch technique successfully with the Super Heavy booster on a couple of occasions. The first successful booster catch occurred during Flight 5 in October 2024, when the massive first stage returned to the Starbase pad in Texas and was plucked from the air by the tower arms.
Additional catches followed on later flights, including Flight 7, proving the concept for the booster and building confidence in the system as a whole.
Achieving a similar catch for the upper stage would represent a significant step forward. The ship returns from much higher speeds and greater heat loads after orbital or near-orbital flight. Success would advance SpaceX’s goal of full and rapid reusability, potentially reducing the cost of access to orbit by a factor of 100 or more and supporting ambitions for frequent satellite deployments, lunar missions, and eventual Mars flights.
Musk has long emphasized that true reusability, refueling rather than discarding hardware, is essential for making humanity a multi-planetary species.
As SpaceX continues refining Starship through successive test flights, the coming months will test whether the ambitious catch timeline can be met. The combination of prior booster successes and improving ship landing precision suggests the company is steadily closing in on this historic capability.
SpaceX has achieved an incredible milestone by launching its 11,000th Starlink satellite into orbit.
This accomplishment occurred during the Starlink Group 17-50 mission, which lifted off on August 19 at 04:01 UTC from Space Launch Complex 4 East at Vandenberg Space Force Base in California.
Falcon 9 launches 24 @Starlink satellites from California pic.twitter.com/UscpmAxDls
— SpaceX (@SpaceX) August 19, 2026
A Falcon 9 rocket carried 24 Starlink V2 Mini satellites on this flight, successfully deploying them into low Earth orbit approximately one hour after liftoff. The first stage booster, identified as B1097 on its twelfth flight, landed successfully on the droneship Of Course I Still Love You in the Pacific Ocean.
According to tracking data compiled around that date, this deployment brought the total number of Starlink satellites in orbit to just over 11,000.
The Starlink program began with test satellites known as Tintin A and B, launched on February 22, 2018. The first operational batch of 60 Starlink satellites followed on May 24, 2019, when a Falcon 9 rocket lifted off from Cape Canaveral. Those initial satellites marked the start of a rapid expansion that has continued for more than seven years.
SpaceX has conducted hundreds of dedicated Starlink missions since then, routinely launching batches of 20 to 30 satellites at a time using reusable Falcon 9 rockets. By mid-2026, the company had already surpassed 12,000 total satellites launched across all versions, with continuous replacements for units that deorbit as designed to manage space debris.
Looking ahead, SpaceX continues to expand the Starlink constellation to enhance global broadband coverage, capacity, and speed. The network already serves millions of users across more than 160 countries and supports applications ranging from residential internet to maritime, aviation, and emergency services.
Future plans center on next-generation hardware, including larger V3 satellites capable of delivering substantially higher throughput, which require the increased payload capacity of the Starship vehicle currently under development and testing.
In July, SpaceX submitted an application to the Federal Communications Commission seeking authority for a Gen3 constellation of up to 100,000 satellites. These spacecraft would operate in very low Earth orbit shells at altitudes near 325 kilometers and 475 kilometers. The filing requests use of existing Ku, Ka, V, and E band spectrum along with new greenfield W and D band frequencies between 92 and 275 GHz.
SpaceX states that the expanded system aims to deliver multi-gigabit symmetrical broadband to consumers, enterprises, governments, and billions of AI-powered devices worldwide while handling a majority of global internet traffic. Approval and subsequent deployment would depend on regulatory review and the operational readiness of Starship for high-volume launches.
This ambitious scale reflects SpaceX’s ongoing commitment to providing ubiquitous high-speed connectivity from space.
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