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SpaceX eyes two Falcon 9 launches and a Starship hop in three days (Update: one day!)

All three of these SpaceX rockets could launch between August 29th and 31st. (Richard Angle; NASASpaceflight - bocachicagal)

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Update: In a surprise twist, SpaceX has confirmed plans to launch SAOCOM 1B, Starlink-11, and hop Starship SN6 in less than ten hours on August 30th.

Contingent upon a ULA Delta IV Heavy launch on August 29th, Starlink-11 is scheduled to lift off on a Falcon 9 rocket no earlier than (NET) 10:12 am EDT (UTC-4), followed by SAOCOM 1B on a separate Falcon 9 NET 7:18 pm EDT (UTC-4). Simultaneously, SpaceX is currently working towards a second full-scale Starship hop test between 8 am and 8 pm CDT (UTC-5) on Sunday, August 30th.

Pending an August 29th mission from competitor ULA, SpaceX aims to attempt two orbital Falcon 9 launches and a Starship hop test over the course of just a few days.

A United Launch Alliance (ULA) Delta IV Heavy rocket was originally scheduled to launch the secretive National Reconnaissance Office 44 (NROL-44) spy satellite on Wednesday before the customer requested a 24-hour delay and technical rocket bugs pushed the mission to no earlier than (NET) August 27th and now August 29th. Delta IV Heavy’s low cadence of one or two annual launches has traditionally made it hard for the rocket to launch on time, offering very few opportunities for the company to work the kinks out of the complex system.

ULA’s NROL-44 launch currently holds precedence over other missions scheduled around the same time, meaning that SpaceX has no choice but to delay its own launches every time the ULA mission slips. SpaceX has two launches currently in queue: Argentinian Earth observation satellite SAOCOM 1B was scheduled to launch NET 7:19 pm EDT (UTC-4) on August 28th, while SpaceX’s 11th Starlink v1.0 launch was expected to lift off NET 10:08 am EDIT (UTC-4) on August 30th. Simultaneously, a SpaceX Starship prototype is tracking towards its first short hop somewhere in between those orbital launches. ULA’s second NROL-44 delay has thrown both SpaceX launch dates somewhat up in the air, however.

SpaceX encapsulated SAOCOM 1B in Falcon 9’s payload fairing earlier this month. (CONAE)

Starship SN6 Flight 1

Recent delays to SpaceX’s East Coast launches have pushed the company’s second full-scale Starship hop test to the front of the line. Starship serial number 6 (SN6) is currently scheduled to attempt its first 150m (~500 ft) hop as early as Saturday, August 29th. Coming less than four weeks after Starship SN5 became the first full-scale prototype to successfully lift off (and land) on August 4th, a second successful hop – with an entirely different Raptor engine and Starship prototype – would be an extraordinary feat.

Meanwhile, SpaceX is simultaneously inspecting and repairing the hop-proven Starship SN5 prototype – most likely with the intention of flying the ship again in the near future. According to CEO Elon Musk, SpaceX’s current goal is to perform “several” fast-paced Starship hop tests to streamline the new rocket’s launch operations. The August 29th window for SN6’s 150m hop lasts from 8am to 8pm and the rocket could attempt to lift off as early as 10am to noon.

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Starship SN6 completed a cryo proof test and Raptor static fire on August 16th and August 23rd. (LabPadre)

SAOCOM 1B

Sister to the SAOCOM 1A satellite SpaceX launched from California in October 2018, SAOCOM 1B is more or less identical. Notably, however, it will launch from Florida – the first polar launch planned from the US East Coast in half a century. The reason the United States effectively retired the Eastern polar launch corridor is a bizarre story of Cold War tensions gone awry but the gist is that SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket will ‘dogleg’ midflight, changing its trajectory to avoid overflying populated regions.

Originally scheduled to launch as early as March 30th, the Argentinian satellite has been relentlessly delayed by coronavirus-related restrictions and technical delays. SAOCOM 1B’s Falcon 9 booster was even swapped amidst the delays, switching from B1051 to B1059 as SpaceX strove to fill the gap in its manifest with internal Starlink missions. Now, NROL-44’s technical launch delays have pushed the Falcon 9 mission from August 27th to NET 7:19 pm EDT (UTC-4) on Sunday, August 30th.

SAOCOM 1B will be SpaceX’s first return-to-launch-site (RTLS) booster landing since March 2020.

Falcon 9 B1059 – now scheduled to launch SAOCOM 1B – last returned to port on June 16th after launching Starlink-8. (Richard Angle)

Starlink-11

Finally, prior to NROL-44’s 72-hour slip, SpaceX’s 11th Starlink v1.0 mission and 12th Starlink launch overall was scheduled NET Sunday, August 30th. ULA’s delays have added considerable uncertainty, at one point pushing Starlink-11 to a tentative September 1st NET before the launch date (rather oddly) slipped back into late-August. Assuming SpaceX still has to wait for ULA, the most likely alternative is August 31st, given that August 30th would necessitate two launches in less than ten hours.

SpaceX completed its first operational US military Falcon 9 launch with booster B1060 on June 30th. (Richard Angle)
B1060 completed its first recovery on July 4th. (Richard Angle)

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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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EVgo taps Tesla Superchargers for mass charging expansion

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Credit: EVgo

EVgo has tapped Tesla Superchargers for its most recent efforts to expand its charging presence in the United States, a move that seems logical based on the effectiveness of the automaker’s own infrastructure.

EVgo opened its first Supercharger site in Illinois, a 12-stall station near downtown Chicago at 3145 South Ashland Avenue in the Riverside Square & River’s Edge center, right beside a grocery store. This marks the start of the company’s plan to deploy hundreds of Supercharger stalls across the United States, primarily at grocery-anchored Regency Centers properties where drivers can shop, eat, or run errands while they charge.

The new location uses Tesla’s Magic Dock technology so both NACS and CCS vehicles can plug in natively without drivers needing to carry their own adapters. Peak power reaches 325 kW at this site, with pricing set between $0.25 and $0.35 per kWh depending on the hour—the same rate for Tesla and non-Tesla drivers.

The stalls also appear in Tesla’s in-car navigation and Trip Planner, making them easy for Tesla owners to find and route to. Illinois has seen EV registrations rise nearly 60 percent over the past two years, and EVgo’s broader network has experienced more than 700 percent growth in charging demand over three years, so the timing fits the market’s trajectory.

Choosing Tesla hardware through the Supercharger for Business program turns out to have been a smart, practical move.

Tesla’s V4 stalls and cabinets deliver high, reliable power with a proven track record of strong uptime, while Magic Dock delivers true dual-standard compatibility in one package. Because the sites show up in Tesla’s navigation tools, EVgo instantly gains visibility among millions of existing Tesla drivers, which should raise utilization and help the company double its addressable market as more vehicles adopt NACS. EVgo still owns the stations and sets pricing, yet benefits from Tesla’s established hardware, longer cables, and operational support.

The result is faster, lower-risk infrastructure expansion that serves every EV driver—Tesla or otherwise—with convenient, high-power charging at everyday retail locations. For drivers, that means fewer adapters, more predictable stops, and a denser network just as electric vehicles become everyday transportation.

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Tesla Giga Texas reportedly moves to 24/7 production

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Credit: @JoeTegtmeyer/X

Tesla’s Austin Gigafactory is reportedly shifting to round-the-clock vehicle production through the end of 2026, according to longtime drone observer Joe Tegtmeyer.

In his November 2 update, Tegtmeyer, widely regarded as one of the most reliable independent sources on Giga Texas activity (we call him the Drone GOAT), stated that the plant has added a night shift, creating two 12-hour production shifts.

Tegtmeyer said in his video:

“Now, I do have some interesting news about that when it comes to the production schedule here at Giga Texas, and things are actually looking pretty good, especially when you think about what the demand is and the delivery numbers that they’re looking for and what they’re expecting. So, normally they have shifts Monday through Friday. It’s a day shift and it’s about 10 hours long or so, give or take. But now they’re on day and night shifts and they’re going to 12-hour days. So they’re going to be adding or they have another shift. They have 12 hours for both of them. In addition to that, the typical downtime that we’re going to be seeing around the holidays, specifically Thanksgiving and Christmas to the New Year time frame is actually changed. And we’re not going to see those big several day events where there is no production. At least that’s what the plan is right now. So, it’s really a great sign, I think, when we consider what they’ve done in the past and what production and the deliveries have been so far. So, maybe it’s shaping up to be a really strong quarter.”

Previously, General Assembly typically operated on a single roughly 10-hour day shift, Monday through Thursday or Friday. The new arrangement keeps General Assembly on its Monday-to-Thursday schedule while adding overnight capacity, and most other areas of the factory continue working the full week with some weekend activity.

Notably, the plant is also forgoing the multi-day shutdowns around Thanksgiving and the Christmas–New Year period that have occurred in prior years

Giga Texas currently builds the Model Y, the larger Model Y L, the Cybertruck, and the Cybercab robotaxi. Tesla has not confirmed the shift change or specified which lines will receive the extra output. Recent comments suggest Cybercab production has been constrained by the pace at which the Robotaxi fleet can absorb new vehicles, making the Model Y and Model Y L the more likely beneficiaries as the company works through order backlogs.

Tegtmeyer’s November 2 footage and commentary also highlighted broader site progress. Cortex 2 continues to expand, with additional compute coming online, a roughly 25 percent lengthening of the structure on the north end, and work on a third cooling plant.

The Boring Company tunnel site showed increased activity in the large launch pit, while the Advanced Technology Chip Fab (a SpaceX–Tesla joint R&D facility) continued steel superstructure and heavy truss installation, along with concrete pours.

The reported capacity increase arrives as Tesla aims for a strong fourth quarter following solid third-quarter results. While unconfirmed by the company, the information aligns with Tegtmeyer’s consistent track record of accurate on-site observations.

If Tesla makes the decision to sustain the all-day production plans, the dual 12-hour shifts would meaningfully raise weekly output potential at one of Tesla’s most important manufacturing hubs.

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Tesla opens new “Cybaer” Engineering Center in Berlin

Tesla opened its Berlin Engineering Center, uniting four sites and 30 labs near Giga Berlin.

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Tesla has opened a new engineering hub in Berlin, putting the teams that design and test its European parts about 30 minutes from the factory that builds them.

The Berlin Tesla Engineering Center, or BTEC, opened Wednesday in the Köpenick district. Tesla Europe said on X that the project went from permit to operational in under a year and consolidates four engineering sites and 30 labs onto a single campus. It is the company’s third hub of this kind, after Fremont and Shanghai.

“We’re combining materials, powertrain, vehicle engineering & validation under one roof, enabling a short feedback loop between development & ramp,” Tesla Europe wrote.

 

Tesla converted the former production halls of a cable factory for the site. About 250 engineers and technicians are starting there, most of them relocated from existing Tesla facilities such as Tilburg in the Netherlands. Tesla has already applied for approval of a second phase that would take the headcount to roughly 500, and it put the total investment at €100 million.

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The labs cover battery cells, motors, materials and complete vehicles, and a large hall is set aside for safety testing of components, including airbags. During the opening, staff demonstrated a pedestrian leg impact test on the front of a Tesla using a catapult rig, Tagesspiegel reported. The center’s logo is a cubist Berlin bear that employees call the “Cybaer.”

Tesla said its Berlin design and engineering teams already contributed to the Model Y, Semi and Roadster, and that the work continues at BTEC. The center will handle technical problem solving for Giga Berlin in Grünheide while also developing and validating parts for vehicles built in China and the United States.

“We came here to stay,” BTEC head Brückner told dpa. “We serve all of Europe via Gigafactory Berlin-Brandenburg.” He said a site close to the plant was a priority, and that the old industrial building allowed Tesla to move quickly.

That proximity matters more now that Giga Berlin is growing again. In June, Tesla said it would raise Model Y output at the plant to 7,500 vehicles per week and hire 1,000 more workers after a record first quarter of more than 61,000 units. The factory recently built 7,000 Model Ys in a single week for the first time. Tesla also more than doubled the planned 4680 cell capacity at the site to 18 GWh per year in May, and has talked about eventually taking Grünheide to one million vehicles annually.

Sales are giving Tesla reason to invest. KBA data released the same day showed Tesla’s German registrations nearly quadrupled year over year in October to 2,932 units, bringing the total for the first ten months of 2026 to 47,742.

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