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SpaceX rocket ready for second rideshare launch with 100+ small satellites
For the second time in six months, a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket is ready to launch around 100+ small satellites into low orbit as part of a rideshare mission for dozens of companies and institutions.
Known as Transporter-2, the mission is SpaceX’s second dedicated launch under the Smallsat Rideshare Program it established in 2019. In 2020, SpaceX began its first launches under the program and delivered eight Earth observation satellites to orbit for Planet and BlackSky as co-passengers on three Starlink missions. A fourth Starlink rideshare was later completed with payloads from Capella Space and Tyvak in May 2021.
In January 2021, Falcon 9 successfully launched 143 small satellites into orbit on a mission known as Transporter-1, setting an all-time record for the number of spacecraft flown on a single rocket and emphasizing just how serious and competitive SpaceX’s Smallsat Program really is.
Six months after that milestone mission, Transporter-2 is now ready to launch. On June 22nd, a Falcon 9 rocket was loaded with hundreds of tons of liquid oxygen and rocket-grade kerosene (RP1) and flight-proven booster B1060 successfully ignited its nine Merlin 1D engines, completing a routine wet dress rehearsal (WDR) and static fire test. Transporter-2 will be B1060’s eighth spaceflight and orbital-class launch in less than a year, representing an average of one flight every ~45 days or six weeks.
Now cleared for flight, SpaceX will have since brought Falcon 9 horizontal and rolled the rocket back to its Cape Canaveral LC-40 pad’s integration hangar. Once there, Transporter-2’s payload ‘stack’ – already encapsulated in a payload fairing – will be installed on top of Falcon 9’s expendable second stage and the rocket will be rolled back out to the pad and brought vertical a second time.
It remains to be seen what exactly Transporter-2 will be carrying to orbit. Transporter-1 carried 133 customer spacecraft and 10 of SpaceX’s own Starlink satellites with a collective liftoff mass of around five metric tons (~11,000 lb). The true mass is unknown but the Falcon 9 booster supporting the mission had to land on a drone ship ~550 km (~340 mi) downrange. Transporter-2, however, will reportedly involve an increasingly rare return-to-launch-site (RTLS) landing for Falcon 9 booster B1060, implying that its payloads may be substantially lighter than its predecessor’s.
Based on a rough accounting of known Transporter-2 payloads from rideshare managers Spaceflight, Exolaunch, and others, the mission could feasibly launch with 100+ small satellites onboard. Relative to Transporter-1, the most obvious weight-saving solution would be to exclude Starlink satellites, which likely represented more than a third of missions payload mass at liftoff. Given that SpaceX also appears to be preparing for a flurry of dedicated polar Starlink launches from its West and East Coast pads that could begin as early as July, it’s fairly safe to assume that Transporter-2 will be Starlink-free.
Ultimately, Transporter-2 appears to be on track for a 2:56 pm EDT (18:56 UTC) launch on Friday, June 25th. Stay tuned for updates and webcast details.
Elon Musk
Elon Musk gives his most telling Tesla-SpaceX merger conversation yet
Elon Musk hinted a Tesla-SpaceX merger could be coming, and Wall Street is taking notice.
Elon Musk gave his clearest signal yet that Tesla and SpaceX could eventually combine, telling the All-In Summit in Los Angeles that the two companies’ deepening collaboration makes the question worth asking. Sawyer Merritt first surfaced the highlight on X Tuesday.
Asked directly why Tesla and SpaceX remain separate given how closely they already work together, Musk told hosts at the summit: “Great question there. With all this collaboration, on so many levels, who can imagine what action one might take when there’s so much close collaboration in so many areas.” SpaceX President Gwynne Shotwell, who joined Musk on stage, added that SpaceX personnel have already moved into xAI to fill leadership and engineering gaps, saying the businesses are integrating “faster than I thought,” though “not fully integrated yet,”
The comments landed on top of merger speculation that has been building on Wall Street for months. JPMorgan has called a tie-up “strategically coherent on paper,” pointing to overlapping ambitions in AI, robotics, energy, transportation and space. Jefferies went further, estimating Musk could retain roughly 55.3 percent voting control in a deal structured without a premium, a scenario that would still leave room for Tesla shareholders to come out ahead. On Kalshi, traders now put the odds of a merger before 2028 at 66 percent.
Tesla’s stake in SpaceX, still under one percent, traces back to its earlier investment in xAI, which converted to SpaceX equity after SpaceX absorbed the AI company. The two are also jointly building Terafab, a chip facility in Austin meant to serve both Tesla’s AI computing needs and SpaceX’s satellite ambitions. Wedbush analyst Dan Ives has stood by a 2027 merger timeline for months, and Cathie Wood’s ARK Invest recently floated a similar case, an idea Musk pushed back on directly at the time.
Another Tesla SpaceX merger prediction by ARK Invest has Elon Musk talking
The timing adds another layer. Tesla has scheduled an October 1 unveiling for its next generation Roadster at a venue near SpaceX’s McGregor, Texas test site, using the phrase “Go for launch” in its promotional material. Both stocks dipped roughly 2 percent Monday before recovering slightly in premarket trading Tuesday, with SpaceX shares up about 0.4 percent and Tesla essentially flat.
Musk stopped short of confirming anything is in motion. But unlike his past denials of a corporate restructuring, this response didn’t rule one out, and it came with Shotwell sitting next to him describing an integration that’s already underway.
The Tesla Roadster unveiling is getting hyped up by the company’s CEO Elon Musk, who has been a big reason the product has such high expectations due to delayed timelines and a constant need to make it even more insane than before.
Tesla announced on September 12 that it would officially unveil the Roadster in Waco, Texas, on October 1, ending years of patience for fans and reservation holders who have waited for the all-electric supercar to enter production since 2017.
Musk has said that this event will be well worth the wait on several occasions, and last year on the Joe Rogan Experience, he said that there should be a closing chapter to supercars- the end of cars that aren’t focused on safety.
He said:
“Whether it’s good or bad, it will be unforgettable. My friend Peter Thiel once reflected that the future was supposed to have flying cars, but we don’t have flying cars. I think if Peter wants a flying car, he should be able to buy one. I think it has a shot at being the most memorable product unveil ever. This is some crazy technology in this car. Let’s just put it this way: if you took all the James Bond cars and combined them, it’s crazier than that.”
Musk’s teases have continued, and now that the event is roughly two weeks away, it seems like Roadster is finally going to show up and blow some minds:
It’s out of this world
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) September 13, 2026
Excitement guaranteed
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) September 13, 2026
Tesla has definitely dragged out the development of the Roadster, but there is a good reason for it.
Tesla has been working on many other projects, most notably self-driving efforts to increase passenger safety, and those simply took priority over the Roadster, a low-volume, high-performance sports car that has a lightning-fast acceleration rate of 0-60 MPH in just 1.1 seconds, could potentially fly, and contributes very little to the company’s mission.
However, many people have the Roadster on pre-order through the referral program or with their own money, and it is time that Tesla delivers on that.
Elon Musk
Elon Musk’s Boring Company has big plans for Las Vegas by year’s end
Elon Musk’s Boring Company says Vegas Loop stations will double by year end once again.
The Boring Company says the Vegas Loop’s station count will double by the end of the year, tying the target to a hiring push for drivers and operations managers in Las Vegas. “Vegas Loop is getting bigger – the station count will double by end of year!” the company wrote in a post on X, attaching listings for a Loop driver and a senior Loop operations manager.
The number checks out against what’s already public, with the Vegas Loop currently running 14 operational stations, while the Boring Company’s own project page lists 28 as the target for the end of 2026.
Vegas Loop is getting bigger – the station count will double by end of year!
Urgently hiring exceptional and enthusiastic Drivers and Ops Managers.
Apply here!
Driverhttps://t.co/ZUPXBYTONb
Senior Loop Ops Managerhttps://t.co/mV6V22V8jH pic.twitter.com/IZ9FqIw8WY
— The Boring Company (@boringcompany) September 14, 2026
Much of that growth is tied to tunnels that are already built and waiting on an opening date. A roughly two-mile dual tunnel system under Paradise Road, connecting Westgate to a planned station at 4744 Paradise Road, is expected to open in stages over the coming weeks, Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority chief executive Steve Hill told the Review-Journal last week. New stations at 4744 Paradise, Virgin Hotels Las Vegas, and the former Gordon Biersch site would come online with it, several of them built to speed up rides to Harry Reid International Airport ahead of Formula 1’s Las Vegas Grand Prix.
Clark County entitled Vegas Loop for 123 stations after approving 19 more in August, as Teslarati reported at the time. Entitlement and construction move at different speeds on this project, so county approval alone does not guarantee a station opens on any particular schedule.
Clark County approved 18 additional stations back in 2023, part of a plan that pushed the system’s target to 69 stations across 65 miles, doubling the network on paper for the first time. The target kept climbing after that, to roughly 93 stations by the end of that year and 104 by last year, before August’s vote pushed it to 123. This week’s announcement is the first time that doubling language has been attached to stations actually running rather than stations merely approved on a county map.
Ridership gives some sense of what a denser network could carry. Boring Company executive Mike Baier said in July that the Vegas Loop already moves around 40,000 passengers on busy convention days, a total that tops most light rail systems in the country despite the system running on a fraction of its planned tunnel mileage. Company leadership has projected ridership could triple or quadruple once the airport connector tunnels fully open.
Boring Company did not say which stations beyond those already under construction would open by year end, or whether the hiring push points to a fleet expansion alongside the new stops.
Elon Musk gives his most telling Tesla-SpaceX merger conversation yet
Tesla Roadster unveiling is getting hyped up by Elon Musk
