SpaceX launched its latest Falcon 9 rocket on a Starlink mission as Tropical Storm Helene delayed the launch of the next mission to the International Space Station.
The Starlink 9-8 mission launched from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California at 9:01 p.m. PDT (12:01 a.m. EDT, 4:01 a.m. UTC). This was SpaceX’s 64th Starlink launch this year.
The Falcon 9 first stage booster supporting this mission, tail number B1081 in the SpaceX fleet, launched for the tenth time. It previously supported the launch of two missions to the space station (Crew-7 and CRS-29), two climate monitoring satellites (NASA’s PACE and ESA’s EarthCARE), and the Transporter-10 rideshare mission.
Just over eight minutes after launch, B1081 landed on the SpaceX drone ship “Of Course I Still Love You.” This was the 103rd booster landing for OCISLY and the 351st booster landing to date.
Among the 20 Starlink V2 Mini satellites participating in the mission, 13 are equipped with direct-to-cell functionality. If all satellites are successfully deployed, the total number of DTC Starlink satellites launched will increase to 233.
Starlink high-speed internet is now available in Burundi! 🛰️🇧🇮❤️→ https://t.co/p23nRZUB2C pic.twitter.com/mHtu5ZNVum
— Starlink (@Starlink) 24 September 2024
On Tuesday morning, SpaceX announced that the Republic of Burundi will become the latest country to gain access to Starlink internet service. In a post on X (formerly Twitter), Lauren Dreyer, vice president of Starlink Business Operations, posted about the development, which comes about a year after she visited with Burundi’s President Evariste Ndayishimiye and another SpaceX representative to discuss the proposal.
“It is great to see Burundi live in the Starlink sale. At the UN General Assembly last year, I had the opportunity to meet with President Ndayishimiye to discuss this opportunity,” Dreyer wrote. “We thank everyone who helped make this a reality.”
The announcement was first made public by Burundi’s telecommunications regulatory and control authority on Monday. ARCT director Samuel Muhizi said in a letter (written in French and translated using Google Translate) that the aim of launching the service was to “contribute to the provision of fast and reliable internet access in our country and to make it available to all individuals and companies who wish to benefit from the service.”
“The ARCT remains committed to closely monitoring Starlink operations to ensure compliance with applicable regulations, optimal quality of service and consumer protection,” Muhizi wrote in his letter, translated by Google Translate. “Our goal is to promote equitable access to communications technologies. The ARCT is convinced that adding this internet access via low Earth orbit satellites to the Burundian ecosystem of access technologies to provide high-speed internet connectivity will improve broadband connectivity.”
Weather-related delay for Crew-9
While the SpaceX team on the West Coast prepared for the launch of Starlink 9-8, those on the East Coast worked toward the next manned launch to the ISS. On Tuesday, NASA and SpaceX completed the dress rehearsal in dry conditions, with NASA astronaut Nick Hague and Roscosmos cosmonaut Alexandr Gorbunov in the background.
SpaceX then conducted a static fire test of B1085 at Space Launch Complex 40 (SLC-40) at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. These preparations will pave the way for the first crewed launch from SLC-40 in its history.
However, while preparation work continues as planned, the effects of Tropical Storm Helene are changing the launch timeline. In their fifth warning, meteorologists with the 45th Weather Squadron forecast the storm will intensify into a Category 1 hurricane by 8 a.m. EDT (1200 UTC) Wednesday, Sept. 25, when the storm’s center enters the Gulf of Mexico.
They forecast Helene to make landfall along the Florida Panhandle as a Category 3 hurricane around 8 p.m. EDT (00:00 UTC) on Thursday, September 26. Because of possible weather impacts, NASA postponed the mission until Saturday, September 28 at the earliest.
After launch, Hague and Gorbunov will join the others on the ISS and become part of Expedition 72. They will remain in orbit until around February 2025, when they will return to Earth along with NASA astronauts Barry “Butch” Wilmore and Sunita “Suni” Williams.
Falcon 9 and Dragon rolled out and went vertically upwards on launch pad 40 in Florida pic.twitter.com/RUGF1UBxLK
— SpaceX (@SpaceX) 24 September 2024
