A SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket with the Psyche spacecraft launches from NASA’s Kennedy House Heart in Cape Canaveral, Florida, on Oct. 13, 2023.
Chandan Khanna | AFP | Getty Pictures
Elon Musk’s SpaceX smashed its earlier annual file for orbital rocket launches, pulling off 96 profitable missions in 2023 at a blistering common launch tempo of each 4 days.
SpaceX this yr achieved 91 launches with its Falcon 9 rocket and one other 5 with the Falcon Heavy, topping its previous annual record of 61 orbital launches in 2022. For context, SpaceX launched Falcon 9 extra instances this yr than in the complete first decade after the rocket’s debut.
Alongside the way in which this yr, SpaceX landed its 250th orbital rocket booster in addition to launched and landed a single rocket 19 instances, persevering with to push the boundaries of reusing rockets. This week, SpaceX additionally set a brand new firm file for shortest time between orbital launches, at slightly below three hours, which represents the tightest time between Florida launches since NASA’s Gemini 11 mission in 1966.
What’s extra, SpaceX’s launch rely for the yr doesn’t embrace its pair of Starship test flights, which weren’t carrying industrial payloads sure for orbit.
Jon Edwards, SpaceX vice chairman of Falcon launch automobiles, wrote in a social media put up that just some years in the past, Musk recommended “a goal of 100 launches as a thought experiment.”
“Here we are. I’m so incredibly proud to work with the best team on earth, and so excited to see what we achieve next year,” Edwards wrote.
SpaceX officers have mentioned the corporate goals to launch as many as 144 Falcon missions in 2024, because it continues to deploy satellites for the Starlink system that drives a serious portion of its $180 billion valuation.
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