News
SpaceX Falcon 9 rockets and drone ship wow with sunset, sunrise port returns
With two back-to-back Starlink launches, SpaceX drone ship Of Course I Still Love You (OCISLY) has returned to port twice in two weeks with Falcon 9 boosters and some of the most beautiful sunrise and sunset backdrops yet seen.
Two days after its sixth successful launch and drone ship landing, Falcon 9 booster B1060 sailed into Port Canaveral on OCISLY around sunset on March 26th. Two weeks later, the same drone ship returned to port once again, this time carrying Falcon 9 booster B1058 back to land after a flawless seventh launch and landing and near-record-breaking 27-day turnaround.
Virtually identical beyond the boosters that launched them, both B1060 and B1058 were tasked with supporting two missions to deliver batches of 60 new Starlink satellites into low Earth orbit. Of the ten launches SpaceX has completed in 2021, eight have been Starlink missions, altogether placing 490 satellites weighing almost 130 metric tons (290,000 lb) into orbit.
Incredibly, Falcon 9 B1058 and B1060 alone have been responsible for six of those ten launches, making the pair – in no uncertain terms – the shining workhorses of SpaceX’s rocket fleet. Put in a slightly different way, SpaceX is now regularly flying multiple Falcon boosters on an almost monthly basis. With just a handful of similarly-capable boosters, SpaceX could feasibly achieve 60+ Starlink launches annually while still maintaining an almost secondary fleet of (relatively) lightly-used boosters for customer missions.
As it turns out, SpaceX already has three once-flown Falcon 9 boosters of the same age (batch?) as B1058 and B1060 – at least two of which are waiting for crucial flight-proven debuts for NASA and the US military. After acing Crew Dragon’s operational Crew-1 astronaut launch debut last November, B1061 is scheduled to become the first flight-proven liquid rocket booster to launch astronauts with NASA’s Crew-2 mission on April 22nd. B1062, having successfully launched the US military’s GPS III SV04 navigation satellite in November 2020, is scheduled to launch a second GPS III satellite in July 2021 – a first for the US military.
Meanwhile, Falcon 9 B1063 may have been transported from California to Florida after successfully launching NASA and ESA’s Sentinel 6A Earth observation satellite and completing SpaceX’s first Vandenberg launch in almost 18 months – also in November 2020. If all three of those new once-flown boosters were to enter SpaceX’s general-purpose fleet after their next major customer missions and prove to be as low-maintenance as B1058 and B1060, those five rockets alone could potentially support an annual cadence of 50-60+ Starlink launches.
It’s also possible that – having finally seen the clear viability of flight-proven rockets writ large – NASA and the US military will effectively choose to keep B1061, B1062, and possibly B1063 primarily in-house, so to speak. Depending on their contracts, by paying SpaceX a premium or forgoing discounts for flight-proven first stages, both could feasibly ensure that those boosters remain mostly (or totally) exclusive to NASA or US military missions.
Ultimately, whether SpaceX gets to add those comparatively new boosters to its Starlink and commercial fleet, B1058 and B1060 show no signs of stopping and – perhaps alongside B1049 and B1051 – could easily sail past their ten-flight milestones before the year is out. Many, many more spectacular drone ship recoveries to come, in other words.
Elon Musk
Brazil Supreme Court orders Elon Musk and X investigation closed
The decision was issued by Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes following a recommendation from Brazil’s Prosecutor-General Paulo Gonet.
Brazil’s Supreme Federal Court has ordered the closure of an investigation involving Elon Musk and social media platform X. The inquiry had been pending for about two years and examined whether the platform was used to coordinate attacks against members of the judiciary.
The decision was issued by Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes following a recommendation from Brazil’s Prosecutor-General Paulo Gonet.
According to a report from Agencia Brasil, the investigation conducted by the Federal Police did not find evidence that X deliberately attempted to attack the judiciary or circumvent court orders.
Prosecutor-General Paulo Gonet concluded that the irregularities identified during the probe did not indicate fraudulent intent.
Justice Moraes accepted the prosecutor’s recommendation and ruled that the investigation should be closed. Under the ruling, the case will remain closed unless new evidence emerges.
The inquiry stemmed from concerns that content on X may have enabled online attacks against Supreme Court justices or violated rulings requiring the suspension of certain accounts under investigation.
Justice Moraes had previously taken several enforcement actions related to the platform during the broader dispute involving social media regulation in Brazil.
These included ordering a nationwide block of the platform, freezing Starlink accounts, and imposing fines on X totaling about $5.2 million. Authorities also froze financial assets linked to X and SpaceX through Starlink to collect unpaid penalties and seized roughly $3.3 million from the companies’ accounts.
Moraes also imposed daily fines of up to R$5 million, about $920,000, for alleged evasion of the X ban and established penalties of R$50,000 per day for VPN users who attempted to bypass the restriction.
Brazil remains an important market for X, with roughly 17 million users, making it one of the platform’s larger user bases globally.
The country is also a major market for Starlink, SpaceX’s satellite internet service, which has surpassed one million subscribers in Brazil.
Elon Musk
FCC chair criticizes Amazon over opposition to SpaceX satellite plan
Carr made the remarks in a post on social media platform X.
U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Chairman Brendan Carr criticized Amazon after the company opposed SpaceX’s proposal to launch a large satellite constellation that could function as an orbital data center network.
Carr made the remarks in a post on social media platform X.
Amazon recently urged the FCC to reject SpaceX’s application to deploy a constellation of up to 1 million low Earth orbit satellites that could serve as artificial intelligence data centers in space.
The company described the proposal as a “lofty ambition rather than a real plan,” arguing that SpaceX had not provided sufficient details about how the system would operate.
Carr responded by pointing to Amazon’s own satellite deployment progress.
“Amazon should focus on the fact that it will fall roughly 1,000 satellites short of meeting its upcoming deployment milestone, rather than spending their time and resources filing petitions against companies that are putting thousands of satellites in orbit,” Carr wrote on X.
Amazon has declined to comment on the statement.
Amazon has been working to deploy its Project Kuiper satellite network, which is intended to compete with SpaceX’s Starlink service. The company has invested more than $10 billion in the program and has launched more than 200 satellites since April of last year.
Amazon has also asked the FCC for a 24-month extension, until July 2028, to meet a requirement to deploy roughly 1,600 satellites by July 2026, as noted in a CNBC report.
SpaceX’s Starlink network currently has nearly 10,000 satellites in orbit and serves roughly 10 million customers. The FCC has also authorized SpaceX to deploy 7,500 additional satellites as the company continues expanding its global satellite internet network.
Energy
Tesla Energy gains UK license to sell electricity to homes and businesses
The license was granted to Tesla Energy Ventures Ltd. by UK energy regulator Ofgem after a seven-month review process.
Tesla Energy has received a license to supply electricity in the United Kingdom, opening the door for the company to serve homes and businesses in the country.
The license was granted to Tesla Energy Ventures Ltd. by UK energy regulator Ofgem after a seven-month review process.
According to Ofgem, the license took effect at 6 p.m. local time on Wednesday and applies to Great Britain.
The approval allows Tesla’s energy business to sell electricity directly to customers in the region, as noted in a Bloomberg News report.
Tesla has already expanded similar services in the United States. In Texas, the company offers electricity plans that allow Tesla owners to charge their vehicles at a lower cost while also feeding excess electricity back into the grid.
Tesla already has a sizable presence in the UK market. According to price comparison website U-switch, there are more than 250,000 Tesla electric vehicles in the country and thousands of Tesla home energy storage systems.
Ofgem also noted that Tesla Motors Ltd., a separate entity incorporated in England and Wales, received an electricity generation license in June 2020.
The new UK license arrives as Tesla continues expanding its global energy business.
Last year, Tesla Energy retained the top position in the global battery energy storage system (BESS) integrator market for the second consecutive year. According to Wood Mackenzie’s latest rankings, Tesla held about 15% of global market share in 2024.
The company also maintained a dominant position in North America, where it captured roughly 39% market share in the region.
At the same time, competition in the energy storage sector is increasing. Chinese companies such as Sungrow have been expanding their presence globally, particularly in Europe.
Brazil Supreme Court orders Elon Musk and X investigation closed
FCC chair criticizes Amazon over opposition to SpaceX satellite plan
