SpaceX is about to launch 22 Starlink web satellites from Florida tonight (Nov. 17), the primary of two planned Starlink missions this weekend.
A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket is scheduled to lift off from Florida’s Cape Canaveral Space Force Station tonight during a four-hour window that opens at 11:00 p.m. EDT (0400 GMT on Nov. 18).
You possibly can watch the motion live via SpaceX’s account on X (formerly often known as Twitter). Coverage is anticipated to start about five minutes before launch.
Related: Starlink satellite train: Tips on how to see and track it within the night sky
If all goes in response to plan, the Falcon 9’s first stage will come back to Earth for a vertical landing about 8.5 minutes after launch on the drone ship Just Read the Instructions, which can be stationed within the Atlantic Ocean.
It should be the eleventh launch and landing for this rocket’s first stage, in response to a SpaceX mission description.
The 23 Starlink satellites, meanwhile, will deploy from the Falcon 9’s upper stage into low Earth orbit about 65.5 minutes after liftoff.
Tonight’s launch is the primary of two planned Starlink missions this weekend. SpaceX also goals to loft 22 of the broadband satellites from California’s Vandenberg Space Force Base on Sunday (Nov. 19) at 1:55 a.m. EDT (0555 GMT; 10:55 p.m. local time Nov. 18 in California).
And there is other SpaceX motion on tap this weekend as well: The corporate plans to launch the second-ever test flight of its huge Starship rocket on Saturday from its South Texas site, during a 20-minute window that opens at 8 a.m. EDT (1300 GMT). You possibly can watch that highly anticipated flight live here at Space.com when the time comes.