Martin Luther King Day launch for SpaceX
January 18, 2021
By Chris Forrester
SpaceX is planning a launch on January 18th despite it being the Martin Luther King national holiday in the US.
Weather permitting, SpaceX hopes to launch its latest batch of sixty Starlink satellites at 08.45am (Florida time) from Elon Musk’s Pad 39A at the Kennedy Space Centre.
The launch will take the Starlink satellites to join around 1,000 already in orbit. It will be the 17th launch for the satellite constellation.
Currently, SpaceX is also planning a second launch later this week, with 10 Starlink satellites as part of a ‘Transporter 1’ mixed cargo of small satellites. SpaceX is targeting January 21st for the Transporter 1 flight (at around 09.30am Florida time) again dependent on weather conditions.
In total, SpaceX plans to have around six launches during January and February for its fleet of Starlink satellites. But this year promises to be mega-busy for SpaceX with a targeted 48 missions, almost one per week, for its Falcon 9 rocket.