Kennedy Space Center and Cape Canaveral Air Force Station were largely spared the brunt of Hurricane Irma due to last-second changes to its projected path. Both SpaceX and ULA have since reported that damages to their facilities are minimal and unlikely to contribute to any delays in upcoming launches, of which SpaceX has several.
Several days before Hurricane Irma reached Florida, the storm projected to make landfall almost directly on Cape Canaveral, stoking fears of spaceflight journalists and forcing the evacuation of several living on the Space Coast. While Irma’s course veered southeast as it neared the Space Coast, Cape Canaveral eventually experienced some level of heavy rain, flooding, and high winds on Sunday and Monday. A NASA flyover of Kennedy Space Center illustrated this best, with very little damage visible from the helicopter, aside from some limited flooding and some mild damage to the roofs of several buildings.
Modern facilities at the Cape are generally built to tolerate Category 5 winds of 150 mph, and Irma appeared to potentially pose a threat to even those structures in the early days of forecasts. However, with maximum recorded winds of around 100 mph from Irma, worries more centered around tornadoes formed by the hurricane, as well as more temporary structures that were under construction. Gwynne Shotwell commented on this earlier today, speaking at the World Satellite Business Week meeting in Paris, France. SpaceX’s President said that LC-39A and SLC-40 looked fine in initial flyovers performed by the company. Her main concern was an array of construction materials and temporary shelters currently at SLC-40 that were exceptionally vulnerable to hurricane conditions.
SpaceX’s LC-39A launch pad seen from a NASA helicopter on 9/12. Thankfully, no damage is readily apparent. (NASA)
Following natural (and unnatural) disasters at Kennedy Space Center and CCAFS, access is restricted to a select crew of emergency reaction teams that are tasked with combing through the myriad facilities and cataloging any serious damage and potential dangers for workers. Once they are finished with their surveys, nonessential personnel are allowed to return to their workplaces and begin their own surveys and repairs. CCAFS and the 45th Space Wing began allowing nonessential personnel back into the facility on Tuesday, while Kennedy Space Center may open its gates on Thursday. Once allowed back in, SpaceX can begin their own damage survey and conduct any necessary repairs.
The company is planning to conduct its next East Coast launch as early as October 2nd, with a second October launch from Florida expected no earlier than October 14th. SpaceX is also scheduled to launch Iridium’s third group of ten NEXT satellites from California on October 4th, so the company has an extremely busy month ahead. Thankfully, with more than two weeks between now and next launch, SpaceX will likely have plenty of time to undertake all necessary repairs, so long as damage is minimal.
7th and 8th sats for Launch #3 just pulled out to head towards VAFB. I feel better knowing there's a guard riding along to protect them! pic.twitter.com/6NppidPhDh
— Matt Desch (@IridiumBoss) September 4, 2017
While SpaceX was spared, those more directly in the path of Irma were not nearly as lucky. In Florida, nearly 25% of all residents were without power for days, and many millions are still waiting for utility companies to repair widespread damage to their infrastructure. Many homes have undoubtedly been destroyed beyond repair. Floridans were largely spared from the deadly threat of Irma by widespread evacuation orders on the East coast, but most residents of islands along Irma’s path had nowhere to evacuate. Dozens of deaths have been reported in Barbados, the Virgin Islands, and other islands. Many more were killed and injured in Cuba. Recovery from Irma will undoubtedly take many years.
Elon Musk
SpaceX Starship just nailed something it’s never done before
SpaceX’s Starship flew successfully Friday, landing both stages and deploying its first Starlink V3 satellites.
Starship’s thirteenth test flight delivered exactly what SpaceX needed with a clean liftoff, two successful stage recoveries, and the first real payload the vehicle has ever carried to space. Booster 20 and Ship 40 lifted off at 5:51 p.m. CT from Starbase, and by the time the mission wrapped roughly an hour later, both halves of the rocket had done exactly what they were supposed to do.
Booster 20 separated from Ship 40 a few minutes into the flight and stuck a controlled splashdown in the Gulf of Mexico about six minutes after liftoff. That is a meaningful turnaround from Flight 12 in May, when the booster lost several engines during its boostback burn before a hard water landing attempt.
Starship as seen from Starlink satellites pic.twitter.com/e2hvfmnewh
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) July 25, 2026
Starship 40’s performance was arguably the bigger win. The vehicle deployed the first 20 operational Starlink V3 satellites Starship has ever carried, then flew a suborbital arc to a landing in the Indian Ocean that SpaceX commentator Dan Huot called the company’s softest splashdown yet. “This is a dream scenario for this team that’s trying to get this heat shield data,” Huot said on the live broadcast, according to Space.com’s live coverage. “I’m a little over the moon right now. Wow. Lucky number 13.”
Unlike the mass simulators SpaceX flew on Flight 12, these were production Starlink V3 satellites, meant to extend solar arrays and antennas and attempt to link with the broader constellation before reentering minutes later. Getting real hardware through a full deploy sequence on only the second flight of the V3 generation keeps Starship on schedule for the payload work NASA is counting on for future Artemis lunar landings.
What an awesome launch, really seems like everything went super well and it was all incredibly smooth.
SpaceX is awesome. Very interested to see how the market will respond on Monday pic.twitter.com/KSHmyBfV55
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) July 25, 2026
— TESLARATI (@Teslarati) July 25, 2026
The flight also arrives at a moment when SpaceX needed a win. SPCX has traded below its $135 IPO price since mid-July, as Teslarati reported when the mission slipped to Friday, and short interest has climbed to roughly a third of the tradable float. A clean flight will not fix a balance sheet, but it does answer the one question SpaceX absolutely needed answered this week: whether the fixes made after the July 16 abort would hold up under real flight conditions. They did, on both stages, on the first try after the redesign.
SpaceX has not set a target date for Flight 14, though the company has said it wants to push toward an orbital attempt on the next mission. After Friday, that goal looks a lot more within reach.
Tesla’s Supercharger Diner in Los Angeles dominated the company’s global usage rankings after just one year, proving the concept is more than just a one-off novelty location that will fade away.
The performance could incite the company to build more locations, something that CEO Elon Musk has hinted at for some time.
Tesla’s Supercharger Diner delivered 21.2 GWh of energy in its first year of operation, the company’s head of Charging, Max de Zegher, revealed on X. Of the top 10 most utilized Supercharger locations in Tesla’s global infrastructure, the Diner in Los Angeles was the most used by drivers, and it wasn’t particularly close:
Tesla Diner opened exactly 1 year ago. Inspiring that futuristic places like this exist.
It’s our highest usage Supercharger in the world: 21.2 GWh delivered in a year, 1.6k sessions/day.
Top 10 Superchargers by energy delivered: https://t.co/9YvJ8lw696 pic.twitter.com/koB3AUJHws
— Max (@MdeZegher) July 21, 2026
On its launch day one year ago, nobody was too sure what the Tesla Diner would be about. It seemed like an interesting concept, and considering it had been in the works for years, it was a highly anticipated launch that many were looking forward to.
Based on its success, we could see additional Diners with Superchargers built throughout the United States, and potentially beyond. Musk has said on several occasions that the company would be willing to bring the Diner idea to more markets.
Tesla makes major change at Supercharger Diner amid epic demand
Of the markets that Musk has mentioned, both Palo Alto and Austin have come to be perceived as ideal selections. However, there are no concrete plans as of now to build new Supercharger Diners anywhere; the location on Santa Monica Boulevard will remain the exclusive spot to pick up Tesla-inspired eats, at least for the time being.
Tesla short sellers won big following the company’s massive fall on Wall Street after it reported subpar Earnings on Wednesday.
Tesla short sellers collected about $4.12 billion in single-day profits on Thursday, according to Bloomberg. Shares fell as much as 15 percent during Thursday’s session. It closed as one of the worst days for Tesla on Wall Street in the past three years.
Investors sold off the stock after Tesla said it would aggressively direct its spending toward AI and its Optimus robot project. The company had record revenues, which were driven by one of the strongest quarters in terms of vehicle deliveries in company history.
However, it missed EPS estimates by reporting just $0.33, a far cry from the $0.53 analysts expected.
S3 Partners reported that about 3 percent of Tesla’s outstanding stock is sold short. Managing Director at S3, Ihor Dusaniwsky, provided the short seller’s potential profit, as well as another figure: shorts have likely had paper gains of $8.92 billion this year, as Tesla shares are down 30 percent in 2026.
Tesla (TSLA) Q2 2026 earnings results: miss on EPS, beat on revenue
Tesla has burned short sellers many times in the past, but the company’s latest Earnings Call was a chance for those skeptics to taste some payback. Although the company gave some very transparent information regarding future projects, the rollout of Robotaxi, Optimus, and Semi, many investors took their profits on Thursday.
Notable short sellers like Michael Burry have been transparent about their skepticism around Tesla shares. Burry just revealed three weeks ago that he had opened up a new short on the stock, stating he shorted Tesla shares at $416.22. “Happy it jumped back to this level,” he said in a blog post.
At the time of publication, Tesla shares were down about 3 percent and the stock was trading at $309.92.
SpaceX Starship just nailed something it’s never done before
Tesla’s Supercharger Diner probably just secured more locations
