Weekly Spaceflight Update: May 3rd – 10th
The week of May 3–10 was pretty quiet compared to some of the weekly updates we have had in the past, with only two launches occurring within that span. However, SpaceX is getting busy in Texas ahead of Starship’s 12th flight test. Below is a recap of this week.
Starlink Group 17-29 – At 8:59 p.m. Pacific Time on May 5th, SpaceX launched a Falcon 9 rocket carrying 24 Starlink V2 Mini satellites to low-Earth orbit from Space Launch Complex 4E (SLC-4E) at Vandenberg Space Force Base in California. The booster supporting this mission (B1081) made its 24th flight and successfully landed on the droneship Of Course I Still Love You (OCISLY) shortly after launch.
Credit: SpaceX
Tianzhou 10 – At 8:14 a.m. local time (Beijing Time) on May 11th, CASC launched a Long March 7 rocket from LC-201 at the Wenchang Space Launch Site in China, carrying the Tianzhou-10 cargo resupply spacecraft to the Tiangong space station. This marked the 10th flight in the Tianzhou series and delivered essential supplies, propellant, and equipment to support the ongoing operations of China’s Tiangong space station and its crew.
Credit: CASC
Meanwhile at Starbase, TX, SpaceX has continued testing its Starship vehicles Ship 39 and Booster 19, ahead of a potential NET launch date of May 15, per local marine and air notices. Earlier this week, Super Heavy Booster 19 was rolled out to the pad, conducted fueling tests, and was static fired on Thursday, May 7. SpaceX reported via social media that the test was successful, with full thrust achieved across all 33 Raptor engines. Later in the week, SpaceX rolled out Ship 39 to the pad, where it was stacked atop Booster 19 for the first time ever. This marked the first V3 Starship stack at Starbase. With the vehicles now stacked, SpaceX will proceed with wet dress rehearsal operations, running tests that simulate launch-day procedures. After that, there is seemingly not much left to do before we see the first launch of Starship V3 from Texas as soon as next week.
Credit: SpaceX
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