Q&A with Keith Gendreau, principal investigator of the first X-ray space communications experiment (members only)

As SpaceX engineers put together the first model of the company’s new Falcon Heavy rocket, officials have not ruled out flying a paying customer’s satellite aboard the maiden flight of the humongous launcher scheduled later this year, the company’s president told Spaceflight Now.

Watch a video replay of Thursday’s liftoff of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from pad 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, carrying the Es’hail 2 communications satellite into orbit.

The Starlink 15-11 mission added another 27 broadband internet satellites to the low Earth orbit megaconstellation. Liftoff from pad 4E at Vandenberg Space Force Base happened at 3:40 a.m. PST (6:40 a.m. EST / 1140 UTC).