Falcon 9

SpaceX gave an Italian radar satellite a picture-perfect ride into orbit with a memorable Monday evening launch from Cape Canaveral on top of a Falcon 9 rocket. A clear sunset sky offered spectators dazzling views of the reusable booster’s fiery climb into space and pyrotechnic plunge back to Earth.

The first launch of the year from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California, set for Wednesday afternoon, will send a payload into orbit for the U.S. government’s spy satellite agency aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket.

A cruise ship that ventured under the planned flight path of a Falcon 9 rocket near Cape Canaveral Sunday forced SpaceX to delay launch of an Italian Earth-imaging satellite for a fourth time, setting up the mission for another try just after sunset Monday.

SpaceX has delayed the launch of a Falcon 9 rocket and an Italian radar satellite for three straight days, and is now aiming to send the mission aloft Sunday evening from Cape Canaveral. The following launch on SpaceX’s schedule, set to carry Starlink internet satellites into orbit, was delayed from Sunday until Monday.

After bad weather and an errant cruise ship prevented launch on four previous days, SpaceX fired a Falcon 9 rocket into orbit Monday from Cape Canaveral with an Italian radar remote sensing satellite. Liftoff occurred at 6:11 p.m. EST (2311 GMT), and the Falcon 9 rocket’s first stage booster successfully returned to Florida’s Space Coast eight minutes later for landing.

A converted SpaceX side booster that flew on two Falcon Heavy missions in 2019 will launch again Thursday as the first stage of a single-stick Falcon 9 rocket set to lift off from Cape Canaveral with an Italian radar imaging satellite.

SpaceX plans to launch an Italian Earth observation satellite with radar vision Thursday evening from Cape Canaveral on a twilight flight that could dazzle spectators with the ascent and descent of the reusable Falcon 9 booster.

A package of 49 Starlink satellites that rode a Falcon 9 rocket into orbit Tuesday night from Florida included the 2,000th spacecraft to launch into SpaceX’s broadband internet network.

Keeping up a rapid-fire launch cadence to begin 2022, SpaceX launched another Falcon 9 rocket Tuesday night from Kennedy Space Center in Florida with 49 Starlink internet satellites. Liftoff from pad 39A occurred at 9:02 p.m. EST Tuesday (0202 GMT Wednesday), following a one-day delay to wait for better conditions in the offshore booster recovery zone north of the Bahamas.

Forecasters expect brisk winds and chilly temperatures for a prime time, full moon launch of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket with another batch of Starlink internet satellites Monday night from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida.