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(Update: delayed) SpaceX fires up Falcon 9 for second Starlink launch this month

Six weeks after its last orbital launch and landing, Falcon 9 booster B1058 is ready to fly again. (Richard Angle)

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Update: SpaceX has delayed Falcon 9’s Starlink-20 to no earlier than (NET) 3:13 am EST (08:13 UTC) on Thursday, March 11th to allow “additional time for pre-launch checks.”

SpaceX is on track to launch its second Starlink mission this month after successfully completing an increasingly rare Falcon 9 static fire test at the launch pad.

B1058, the flight-proven Falcon 9 booster assigned to the mission, famously became the first privately-developed rocket to launch astronauts back in May 2020 and has completed another four commercial launches in the nine months since. Likely motivated by an abundance of caution after a Falcon 9 booster lost an engine mid-flight and subsequently failed its landing attempt last month, SpaceX chose to perform a static fire test prior to Falcon 9 B1058’s sixth launch, loading the rocket with liquid kerosene and oxygen and briefly igniting all nine of its engines.

Completed without apparent issue and putting on an exceptional show in the process, that static fire has allowed SpaceX to clear the Falcon 9 rocket and 20th batch of Starlink v1.0 satellites (Starlink-20) for a launch attempt at 9:58 pm EST (UTC-5) on Tuesday, March 9th.

Finally out from under the looming spectre of Starlink-17, possibly the most repeatedly delayed launch in SpaceX history, the company is clearly eager to get back to work and make up for a (relatively) slow two-launch February. According to CEO Elon Musk, SpaceX is chasing an ambitious target of 48 launches in 2021, requiring an average of four launches per month.

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A bit less than ten weeks into the new year, SpaceX has completed six launches – nothing to scoff at but still a third short of the nine launches the company would need to have averaged. To still hit that 48-flight target by the end of the year, SpaceX will now need to launch at least once per week for the next 42 weeks.

On the plus side, SpaceX’s 48-launch target firmly puts the company in the “shoot for the Moon, land among the stars” range. Even if it has a few rough months, “falling short” could still equate to an annual launch cadence in the high 30s to low 40s – still an extraordinarily feat and major improvement over SpaceX’s already impressive 26-launch record.

Not long after Falcon 9 B1058’s March 9th Starlink-20 mission, SpaceX has already scheduled a third Starlink launch – Starlink-21 – no earlier than (NET) March 13th, and at least two additional batches of spacecraft are ready to launch in the second half of the month pending launch pad and rocket availability.

Tune in below around 9:40 pm EST (02:40 UTC) to catch the seventh orbital SpaceX launch of the year live.

Eric Ralph is Teslarati's senior spaceflight reporter and has been covering the industry in some capacity for almost half a decade, largely spurred in 2016 by a trip to Mexico to watch Elon Musk reveal SpaceX's plans for Mars in person. Aside from spreading interest and excitement about spaceflight far and wide, his primary goal is to cover humanity's ongoing efforts to expand beyond Earth to the Moon, Mars, and elsewhere.

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Tesla takes first step in sunsetting Model S and X with drastic move

Tesla won’t be taking custom orders of the Model S or Model X in Europe any longer.

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Credit: @supergeek18 | X

Tesla has seemingly taken the first step in sunsetting two of its older vehicles, the Model S and Model X, by ending international orders.

The flagship sedan and SUV from Tesla are the two oldest cars in the company’s lineup. They account for a very small portion of overall sales, and several years ago, CEO Elon Musk admitted that Tesla only continues to build and sell them due to “sentimental reasons.”

Earlier this year, there were calls for Tesla to end the production of the two cars, but Lars Moravy said that the Model S and Model X were due to get some love later in 2025. That happened, but the changes were extremely minor.

Tesla launches new Model S and Model X, and the changes are slim

Some took this as an indication that Tesla has kind of moved on from the Model S and Model X. A handful of people seemed to think Tesla would overhaul the vehicles substantially, but the changes were extremely minor and included only a few real adjustments.

In Europe, customers are unable to even put a new order in on a Model S or Model X.

We noticed earlier today that Tesla pressing the ‘Order’ button on either of the flagship vehicles takes you to local inventory, and not the Design Studio where you’d configure your custom build:

Tesla simply does not make enough Model S or Model X units to justify the expensive logistics process of shipping custom orders overseas. It almost seems as if they’re that they will essentially build a bunch of random configurations, send them overseas every few months, and let them sell before replenishing inventory.

Inversely, it could also mean Tesla is truly gearing up to sunset the vehicle altogether. It seems unlikely that the company will fade them out altogether in the next couple of years, but it could absolutely think about ending international orders because volume is so low.

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Energy

Tesla inks multi-billion-dollar deal with LG Energy Solution to avoid tariff pressure

Tesla has reportedly secured a sizable partnership with LGES for LFP cells, and there’s an extra positive out of it.

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Credit: Tesla

Tesla has reportedly inked a multi-billion-dollar deal with LG Energy Solution in an effort to avoid tariff pressure and domesticate more of its supply chain.

Reuters is reporting that Tesla and LGES, a South Korean battery supplier of the automaker, signed a $4.3 billion deal for energy storage system batteries. The cells are going to be manufactured by LGES at its U.S. factory located in Michigan, the report indicates. The batteries will be the lithium iron phosphate, or LFP, chemistry.

Tesla delivers 384,000 vehicles in Q2 2025, deploys 9.6 GWh in energy storage

It is a move Tesla is making to avoid buying cells and parts from overseas as the Trump White House continues to use tariffs to prioritize domestic manufacturing.

LGES announced earlier today that it had signed a $4.3 billion contract to supply LFP cells over three years to a company, but it did not identify the customer, nor did the company state whether the batteries would be used in automotive or energy storage applications.

The deal is advantageous for both companies. Tesla is going to alleviate its reliance on battery cells that are built out of the country, so it’s going to be able to take some financial pressure off itself.

For LGES, the company has reported that it has experienced slowed demand for its cells in terms of automotive applications. It planned to offset this demand lag with more projects involving the cells in energy storage projects. This has been helped by the need for these systems at data centers used for AI.

During the Q1 Earnings Call, Tesla CFO Vaibhav Taneja confirmed that the company’s energy division had been impacted by the need to source cells from China-based suppliers. He went on to say that the company would work on “securing additional supply chain from non-China-based suppliers.”

It seems as if Tesla has managed to secure some of this needed domestic supply chain.

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Lifestyle

Tesla brings perhaps the coolest interior feature to cars in latest update

Tesla adds on to the “fun” aspect of its vehicles.

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Credit: Tesla

Tesla has brought perhaps the coolest interior feature to its cars in a new update that is rolling out to vehicles now.

The feature will require a newer vehicle that has interior ambient lighting, which is present on the new Model S, Model X, Model 3 “Highland,” and Model Y “Juniper.” The Cybertruck also has ambient lighting strips throughout.

Tesla Model Y’s ambient lighting design changes revealed in leaked video

With the Version 2025.26+ Software Update, Tesla is rolling out a new “Sync Accent Lights w/ Music” feature, which is available on the Tesla Toybox:

To enable the feature, you’ll access the Toybox, choose “Light Sync,” and then choose “Sync Accent Lights w/ Music.”

Although it does not improve the performance of the vehicle, it is yet another example of Tesla making one of the coolest cars out there. This is truly a cool add-on that can be used to impress your friends and family.

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