Falcon 9

Led by a three-time space shuttle flier and former Navy submarine officer, the four-man team set to ride into orbit Monday on SpaceX’s Dragon Endeavour spacecraft rode to the launch pad in Florida in new black Tesla Model Xs and took their seats inside the commercial crew capsule Thursday night for a countdown dress rehearsal.

SpaceX completed a launch doubleheader Friday night with the liftoff of a Falcon 9 rocket from Cape Canaveral carrying a dual-band, six-ton mobile communications relay station for London-based Inmarsat, hours after launching another Falcon 9 from California with a batch of Starlink internet satellites.

A Falcon 9 rocket delivered 51 more Starlink internet satellites into orbit Friday after launching from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California, adding to SpaceX’s global broadband network that reaches all seven continents.

SpaceX teams in California launched a Falcon 9 launch from Vandenberg Space Force Base at 11:12 a.m. PST (2:12 p.m. EST; 1912 GMT) carrying 51 more Starlink internet satellites into orbit.

A large European-built communications satellite owned by London-based Inmarsat is set to ride a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket into orbit Friday night from Cape Canaveral, kicking off a mission to connect ships and airplanes across the Atlantic Ocean and the U.S. East Coast through 2040.