News
SpaceX to ring in Falcon 9 Block 5 future with record-speed Block 4 reuse
SpaceX is days away from effectively bringing to a close an era of moderately reusable Falcon 9s that paved the way for the company’s Block 5 rocket upgrade, designed to dramatically improve reliability and reusability. As if foreshadowing the future its culmination will ring in, the CRS-15 mission will beat SpaceX’s previous record for back-to-back Falcon 9 booster launches by nearly a factor of two.
Scheduled to launch at 5:42 am EDT June 29, the CRS-15 Cargo Dragon mission will be SpaceX’s fourth launch of an orbital, flight-proven spacecraft, and will also cut almost two months off of the Falcon 9 booster refurbishment process. The particular booster, number B1045, launched just two months ago on April 18 before landing aboard SpaceX’s Atlantic drone ship Of Course I Still Love You (OCISLY). After returning to shore, the rocket was transported by road the short few miles from Port Canaveral to Kennedy Space Center and SpaceX’s LC-39A integration facilities, where it is believed to have spent the last nine weeks undergoing moderate repairs, part replacements, and checkouts. Just yesterday, the once-flown booster took to Launch Complex 40 (LC-40) for the second time to complete a preflight static fire, intended to ensure that the rocket is healthy before launch.
Rocket and spacecraft for CRS-15 are flight-proven. Falcon 9’s first stage previously launched @NASA_TESS two months ago, and Dragon flew to the @Space_Station in support of our ninth resupply mission in 2016.
— SpaceX (@SpaceX) June 23, 2018
In reality, the actual time available for B1045’s refurbishment was thus several days less than two months – the only other routinely reusable rocket, the Space Shuttle, lays claim to a fairly staggering record of just 26 days of actual refurbishment, although it’s worth considering the fact that a single one of the Shuttle’s 3 RS-25 rocket engines have been estimated to cost as much as $60 million, considerably more than two thirds of the price of an entire SpaceX mission for NASA.
Although CRS-15 will likely see its venerable Block 4 Falcon 9 booster expended in the ocean without a recovery attempt, the speed of Falcon 9 B1045’s refurbishment is thrilling for another, more abstract reason: if the design functions largely as intended, a Falcon 9 Block 5 booster should be able to handily crush that already impressive record with ease, and one will perhaps do just that within a handful of months of this launch.
Currently scheduled for no earlier than (NET) July 19 and late July to early August, the Telstar 19V and 18V communications satellites will require their own Block 5 launches roughly a month from today, and July 20’s Iridium NEXT-7 mission will further require its own Falcon 9 Block 5 booster for a mission from California. It remains to be seen what boosters will launch those three missions, as well as an additional two SpaceX missions tentatively scheduled for August and September.
- After launching in April 2018, B1045 landed on OCISLY and is being refurbished for a second launch in just 5 days, on June 29. (Tom Cross)
- Falcon 9 B1045 spied in transport from Port Canaveral to LC-39A, April 24. (Instagram /u/xxxtreme81)
- B1045 enters SpaceX’s 39A integration and refurbishment facilities, April 24. (Reddit /u/NewRage)
Of note, those upcoming July launches will see both of SpaceX’s drone ships – Just Read The Instructions (JRTI) on the Pacific, OCISLY in the Atlantic – return to action, with JRTI’s return bringing to an end nearly a full year of inactivity. With a heavy summer and fall manifest of all Block 5 Falcon 9s just around the corner, both drone ships are likely to be busier than ever before. Teslarati photographers Tom Cross (Florida) and Pauline Acalin (California) will be there to document the flurry of launches and recoveries on both coasts over the busy second half of 2018.

The drone ship Of Course I Still Love You spotted in Port Canaveral, FL last December. (Instagram /u/ johnabc123)
Follow us for live updates, peeks behind the scenes, and photos from Teslarati’s East and West Coast photographers.
Teslarati – Instagram – Twitter
Tom Cross – Twitter
Pauline Acalin – Twitter
Eric Ralph – Twitter
Cybertruck
Tesla drops latest hint that new Cybertruck trim is selling like hotcakes
According to Tesla’s Online Design Studio, the new All-Wheel-Drive Cybertruck will now be delivered in April 2027. Earlier orders are still slated for early this Summer, but orders from here on forward are now officially pushed into next year:
Tesla’s new Cybertruck offering has had its delivery date pushed back once again. This is now the second time, and deliveries for the newest orders are now pushed well into 2027.
According to Tesla’s Online Design Studio, the new All-Wheel-Drive Cybertruck will now be delivered in April 2027. Earlier orders are still slated for early this Summer, but orders from here on forward are now officially pushed into next year:
🚨 Tesla has updated the $59,990 Cybertruck Dual Motor AWD’s estimated delivery date to April 2027.
First deliveries are still slated for June, but if you order it now, you’ll be waiting over a year.
Demand appears to be off the charts for the new Cybertruck and consumers are… pic.twitter.com/raDCCeC0zP
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) February 26, 2026
Just three days ago, the initial delivery date of June 2026 was pushed back to early Fall, and now, that date has officially moved to April 2027.
The fact that Tesla has had to push back deliveries once again proves one of two things: either Tesla has slow production plans for the new Cybertruck trim, or demand is off the charts.
Judging by how Tesla is already planning to raise the price based on demand in just a few days, it seems like the company knows it is giving a tremendous deal on this spec of Cybertruck, and units are moving quickly.
That points more toward demand and not necessarily to slower production plans, but it is not confirmed.
Tesla Cybertruck’s newest trim will undergo massive change in ten days, Musk says
Tesla is set to hike the price on March 1, so tomorrow will be the final day to grab the new Cybertruck trim for just $59,990.
It features:
- Dual Motor AWD w/ est. 325 mi of range
- Powered tonneau cover
- Bed outlets (2x 120V + 1x 240V) & Powershare capability
- Coil springs w/ adaptive damping
- Heated first-row seats w/ textile material that is easy to clean
- Steer-by-wire & Four Wheel Steering
- 6’ x 4’ composite bed
- Towing capacity of up to 7,500 lbs
- Powered frunk
Interestingly, the price offering is fairly close to what Tesla unveiled back in late 2019.
Elon Musk
Elon Musk outlines plan for first Starship tower catch attempt
Musk confirmed that Starship V3 Ship 1 (SN1) is headed for ground tests and expressed strong confidence in the updated vehicle design.
Elon Musk has clarified when SpaceX will first attempt to catch Starship’s upper stage with its launch tower. The CEO’s update provides the clearest teaser yet for the spacecraft’s recovery roadmap.
Musk shared the details in recent posts on X. In his initial post, Musk confirmed that Starship V3 Ship 1 (SN1) is headed for ground tests and expressed strong confidence in the updated vehicle design.
“Starship V3 SN1 headed for ground tests. I am highly confident that the V3 design will achieve full reusability,” Musk wrote.
In a follow-up post, Musk addressed when SpaceX would attempt to catch the upper stage using the launch tower’s robotic arms.
“Should note that SpaceX will only try to catch the ship with the tower after two perfect soft landings in the ocean. The risk of the ship breaking up over land needs to be very low,” Musk clarified.
His remarks suggest that SpaceX is deliberately reducing risk before attempting a tower catch of Starship’s upper stage. Such a milestone would mark a major step towards the full reuse of the Starship system.
SpaceX is currently targeting the first Starship V3 flight of 2026 this coming March. The spacecraft’s V3 iteration is widely viewed as a key milestone in SpaceX’s long-term strategy to make Starship fully reusable.
Starship V3 features a number of key upgrades over its previous iterations. The vehicle is equipped with SpaceX’s Raptor V3 engines, which are designed to deliver significantly higher thrust than earlier versions while reducing cost and weight.
The V3 design is also expected to be optimized for manufacturability, a critical step if SpaceX intends to scale the spacecraft’s production toward frequent launches for Starlink, lunar missions, and eventually Mars.
News
Tesla FSD (Supervised) could be approved in the Netherlands next month: Musk
Musk shared the update during a recent interview at Giga Berlin.
Tesla CEO Elon Musk shared that Full Self-Driving (FSD) could receive regulatory approval in the Netherlands as soon as March 20, potentially marking a major step forward for Tesla’s advanced driver-assistance rollout in Europe.
Musk shared the update during a recent interview at Giga Berlin, noting that the date was provided by local authorities.
“Tesla has the most advanced real-world AI, and hopefully, it will be approved soon in Europe. We’re told by the authorities that March 20th, it’ll be approved in the Netherlands,’ what I was told,” Musk stated.
“Hopefully, that date remains the same. But I think people in Europe are going to be pretty blown away by how good the Tesla car AI is in being able to drive.”
Tesla’s FSD system relies on vision-based neural networks trained on real-world driving data, allowing vehicles to navigate using cameras and AI rather than traditional sensor-heavy solutions.
The performance of FSD Supervised has so far been impressive. As per Tesla’s safety report, Full Self-Driving Supervised has already traveled 8.3 billion miles. So far, vehicles operating with FSD Supervised engaged recorded one major collision every 5,300,676 miles.
In comparison, Teslas driven manually with Active Safety systems recorded one major collision every 2,175,763 miles, while Teslas driven manually without Active Safety recorded one major collision every 855,132 miles. The U.S. average during the same period was one major collision every 660,164 miles.
If approval is granted on March 20, the Netherlands could become the first European market to greenlight Tesla’s latest supervised FSD (Supervised) software under updated regulatory frameworks. Tesla has been working to secure expanded FSD access across Europe, where regulatory standards differ significantly from those in the United States. Approval in the Netherlands would likely serve as a foundation for broader EU adoption, though additional country-level clearances may still be required.



