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SpaceX launched its latest batch of Starlink satellites from the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida yesterday. The launch took its latest second generation mini satellites to orbit. After a mission earlier this month that marked the last launch of Starlik 1.5 satellites, moving forward, these launches should account for the bulk of SpaceX's mission cadence. Today's mission came soon after SpaceX set a new record by flying two Falcon 9 rockets 16 times each and after the firm started to face multiple delays on its launches after scrubs less than a minute before liftoff.

SpaceX Looks To Starship As Falcon 9 Starts Launching Second Generation Starlink Satellites

After SpaceX received FCC authorization to start launching its second generation Starlink satellites late last year, the firm has started to use the Falcon 9 rocket for these missions. Due to the size constraints of the Falcon 9 and the fact that Starlink Gen2 spacecraft features a myriad of upgrades that make them larger, the latest bit of launches for the spacecraft, which SpaceX dubs as 'V2 mini' satellites, see far fewer of these crammed inside a Falcon 9's fairing.

Compared to the earliest days of the Starlink buildout, the capacity of the Falcon 9 to deliver these spacecraft to low Earth orbit (LEO) has been reduced by nearly two thirds. SpaceX's primary plans involve using the significantly larger Starship rocket for the larger satellites, and its initial FCC authorization enables it to launch 7,500 of these spacecraft.

Considering the capacity of the Falcon 9, which has seen Gen2 launches remain limited to roughly 22 satellites per mission, SpaceX will need years to build out this phase of the Starlink constellation. To boot, the firm aims to launch 100 missions in 2023 (including Starship flights), and while this is an ambitious target that would see SpaceX break its own launch cadence record, the figure is nonetheless too low for the Falcon 9 to rapidly populate the Starlink Gen2 constellation.

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The launch itself was a typical affair with the Falcon 9 booster that took the satellites to LEO being relatively 'new' by SpaceX's standards since it had flown five missions prior to liftoff. July has been a great month for Starlink launches, as despite multiple hiccups that saw launch delays, SpaceX has launched five Starlink missions in the month so far. In fact, apart from the Euclid satellite that took off on the first, all July launches have been of the Starlink satellites.

The Falcon 9 booster had flown a NASA mission, two Starlink missions and two more for OneWeb and Intelsat before today's launch. It lifted off from the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station at 8:50 pm local time yesterday and landed on a SpaceX drone ship just eight minutes after liftoff. The rocket's second stage featured a traditional engine nozzle bell, indicating that perhaps these missions have higher second stage performance requirements.

SpaceX has recently started to use shorter second stage nozzles to reduce costs on less stringent missions. The second stage is one of the costliest portions of the Falcon 9 since it is the only rocket subsystem that cannot be reused. Therefore, SpaceX has to build a new one for each launch, and the firm aims to change this with Starship.

SpaceX's next mission might see a rare launch where it lands two Falcon boosters simultaneously on drone ships in the ocean after flying the Falcon Heavy. However, the center core will be expended since the payload, a geostationary EchoStar satellite, will be one of the heaviest satellites of its kind. It might also be the heaviest payload that the Falcon Heavy has launched, a feather in the cap for a rocket designed to launch much heavier spacecraft but yet to find a mission to flex its muscles.