This Week in Launch: SpaceX aiming for 80th launch of 2024

This week SpaceX is looking at launching three Falcon 9 rockets, two of those will be for the company’s Starlink constellation. Another payload is a multi-payload satellite that will host missions for the Space Force, Norwegian’s Ministry of Defense, and ViaSat.

This week’s launches:

• August 6 (Tuesday)
  • CASC | Long March 6A | Unknown Payload | 3:00 A.M. ET
    • LC-9A, Taiyuan Satellite Launch Center, China
• August 7 (Wednesday)
  • SpaceX | Falcon 9 | Starlink Group 8-3 | 8:59 A.M. ET
    • SLC-40, Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, Florida
• August 10 (Saturday)
  • SpaceX | Falcon 9 | Starlink Group 10-7 | 7:15 A.M. ET
    • LC-39A, Kennedy Space Center, Florida
• August 11 (Sunday)
  • SpaceX | Falcon 9 | Arctic Satellite Broadband Mission  | 7:00 P.M. PT
    • SLC-4E, Vandenberg Space Force Base, California

SpaceX hits several round number milestones

SpaceX’s Tuesday mission will mark the company’s 80th mission of 2024. We are just over the halfway point of the year and while the company is short on their launch rate, they are still halfway to its 148 launch goal.

While the too week pause in launches due to its second stage anomaly slowed SpaceX down a bit, its ability to make up the time is well documented.

This 80 launch milestone isn’t the only round number milestone SpaceX hit in the last week. Yesterday SpaceX launched its 75th Falcon 9 of the year, that missions was also the 25th flight from Vandenberg Space Force Base. Compared to 2023, SpaceX launched 28 rockets from SLC-4E for the entire year (peep there’s already another one coming this weekend).

Last Friday SpaceX launched the Starlink Group 10-6 mission from NASA’s LC-39A launch site. That was SpaceX’s 50th mission from the East Coast (both LC-39A and SLC-40) and 15th launch from the historic launch pad.

So can SpaceX launch 148 Falcon rockets by the end of this year? Your guess will be as good as mine, as it is going to be a nail biter.