Watch live: SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket Launches 21 Starlink satellites from California

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you evening everyone and Welcome to our

live coverage the latest Mission from

vanderberg space Force Base I'm all

Robinson Smith I'll be providing our

commentary for the duration of this

coverage we're broadcasting from the

space flight now news Bureau here at

NASA's Kennedy Space Center

or Stephen young is running the

technical operations of the broadcast

this evening and being that this is a

West Coast launch our photographers Adam

Bernstein and Michael Kane are off

getting some rest this evening it'll be

a busy few days as we get on into this

upcoming week

as Michael Kane is going to be chasing

the eclipse hoping to get some views of

that down in the Texas area meanwhile

Adam is going to be sticking with us

here in Florida as we have a ride share

mission for SpaceX bandwagon one the

first batch of only 11 satellites as

compared to the dozens that fly on the

transporter missions but 11 satellites

are going to be on board that Falcon 9

rocket lifting off from NASA's Kennedy

Space Center here that's coming up

tomorrow in the 7 o'clock hour pm and

we'll have full coverage on that when

that mission comes up but tonight we

have a starlink launch ahead of us this

is the first batch of satellites going

up to the eighth shell first time for

this shell but the second time that

SpaceX is launching satellites that

feature a direct to cell

capability we recall back on the first

launch of the Year there were six

satellites included in

that Starling Cadre that went up to low

earth orbit that had Direct to sell

features and they've done a lot of

testing of that service on the ground

very much in the I guess pre- beta stage

if you want to refer to it like that but

theyve been able to uh make calls uh

post to X formally known as Twitter as

well as sent text messages so so far the

servic is proving to be what they were

hoping I'm going to add six more to that

ultimately to get up to believe they

told the EPCC about

7,500 direct to sell capable starlinks

as part of the

constellation and a lot of those are

going to be launching in the front half

of this year so we'll be keeping track

as much as SpaceX is going to be

publishing when the direct cell

starlinks head up to low earth

orbit but tonight we have six out of the

total of 21 that are part of this

mission

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we are currently less than 30 minutes

away from the launch of this Mission

from Vandenberg space Forest base Bonine

rocket will be lifting off from space

launch complex 4 East or slick

4E

lift office up for 7:25 p.m. Pacific as

you can see at the bottom of your screen

10:25 Eastern 0225 UTC in other words T

minus 22 minutes 13 seconds from

now we do have word from space that that

propellent load has begun so they are

committing themselves to this t0 time

tonight even though the window lasts

quite a bit longer hopefully everything

is moving along track as it appears to

be for an ontime

departure at 7:25 Pacific

tonight certainly appreciate the 5200 of

you who are joining with us live this

evening you haven't already to allow

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into the last 20 odd minutes before

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step step on through the count but

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chat as much as we possibly can we're at

t- minus 19 minutes 2 6 seconds in

counting with propellant load underway

let's go ahead and talk about the

remaining Milestones that are left in

the count

today started at T-minus 30 minutes when

the launch director hold the team for

the start of prop load which began with

propellent load at T minus 35

minutes rp1 a rocket grade kerosene

being loaded on the first and second

stages of the Falcon 9 rocket and the

oxygen being loaded on board the first

stage tus 30 minutes is when the

cryogenic helium load

began that helium is loaded onto the

pressure vessels of the first stage at

the 30 minute Mark and it's used to

pressurize the main propellent tanks

during

flight T minus 25 minutes it's when that

process begins on the second stage

brings us up to just a few minutes go

when the loading of uh Second Stage

kerosene wrapped up

just a couple minutes ago about T minus

20 minutes 50 seconds is when the strong

back chill down process began if you

recall from our Cape base

launches that's when we see the

so-called big vent from the strong back

visually striking sign as the feed lines

are being chilled prior to Second Stage

locks load which is coming up in just 2

minutes from now t- 16 minutes that's

followed at the tus 7 Mark with the

chill down of the N9 Merlin 1D engines

there at the bottom of the falcon9 first

stage they flow a small amount of liquid

oxygen through the plumbing in the turbo

pumps and protects the engines from the

risk of thermal shock and damage during

the startup

sequence about six minutes out the first

stage kerosene tank should be full then

at T minus 4 and a half minutes the

strong back retract sequence begins here

in Vandenberg the transporter erector or

the strong back reclines about 13° away

from the Falcon 9 rocket and it stays in

that position until

liftoff about 3 minutes out the first

stage liquid oxygen tank is fully

loaded two minutes out second stage lock

load wraps up and that means the Falcon

9 rocket is fully loaded with 1 million

pounds of

propellant in the final 60 seconds

control of the countdown is handed over

from the ground sequencer to the falcon9

onboard flight computers the propelling

tanks are brought up to flight pressure

45 seconds out the SpaceX launch

director will give their go for liftoff

the ENT ignition command is issued at T

minus 3 seconds and then of course if

all nine Merlin 1D engines ignite and

are

healthy old down clamps will get the

command to release the Falcon 9 for a

liftoff at t0 which again it's coming up

at 7:25 p.m. Pacific 10:25 p.m. Eastern

in 0225 UTC or in 20 or excuse me 6 15

minutes 26 seconds in

counting want to thank a few more folks

for your support this evening Taskmaster

music with a $2 Super Chat thank you so

much

Taskmaster want to welcome

George leas to channel membership at the

pad leader level welcome aboard George

glad to have you with us hope you enjoy

the perks of Channel

membership and to one of our current

channel members Christopher Jones thank

you so much for the $2 Super Chat as

well really appreciate that good to see

you this

evening if you had an opportunity to

catch Elon musk's update on Starship

earlier today it's about a 45 minute or

so presentation that he made talking

about the evolution and the progress for

that launch vehicle doing quite a bit

with the Starship program of course

eventually it will be launching from

here in Florida not for some time but

they are working towards having two

operational Towers both at Starbase and

two here at the

cape not looking at having their first

Cape based Starship Tower operational

sometime in the middle of next year

eoli viewers of Launchpad live will have

noticed that they have been dismantling

the previously built legs there at the

base of the Starship

Tower working to create a functional

system more in line with what's at

Starbase musk said that Starbase will

continue to be more of the Developmental

and testing side of the Starship program

meanwhile more of the operational side

of things will eventually start to shift

to Cape

Canaveral they're also looking at

potentially trying to catch the super

heavy booster during the fifth flight it

sounds like things are still on track of

course with FAA approval which is still

outstanding but a fourth launch of

Starship sometime in May is very much

within the realm of possibilities so you

may be seeing us head back to Southern

Texas in the not too distant

future Starship program constantly

keeping us on our

toes musk also briefly touched on having

marine-based launch pads for Starship

down the road as he described needing to

Launch

hundreds if not thousands of Starships

in waves in order to as his stated goal

has been for many years at this point to

make life

multiplanetary the renderings are Quite

a feat so it's definitely worth giving

it a watch and a listen if you'd like to

get an update there on the Starship

program of course it'll

be used to launch the larger version of

the Starling satellites compared to the

on that will be lifting off with this

Falcon 9 launch today in 12 minutes and

52

seconds for this Falcon flies let's go

ahead and walk you through the

trajectory of this Mission we have one

of our channel members Josh king with a

$5 Super Chat thank you so much Josh

asking if this is another Sunset launch

like the last one from

California given the timing it should be

right about Sunset so hopefully we'll

get some very nice views of the Falcon 9

and some folks in the Southwest United

States if the visibility is good you may

see it as far away know we've seen some

photos of Falcon 9 launches from out in

Arizona so hopefully you've got

relatively good visibility and we'll get

some cool pictures coming

up a little over 12 minutes from now

as far as where this bird is going to

fly it's going to leave from space

launch complex 4 East slick 4E and fly

in a southeasterly direction along the

coast of Southern California the western

coast of Mexico that orange line you see

is the path of the first stage booster

today SpaceX is flying booster

1081 spent most of its life over here on

the East Coast having first launch the

crw 7 group of astronauts which arrived

back on Earth not too long

ago it also supported the launch of

spacex's 29th Commercial resupply

Services or CRS mission to the

International Space Station it launched

a group of Starling satellites on the 6-

34 Mission lifting off from pad 40 here

at the cape it also launched n is Pace

spacecraft and Earth observing

spacecraft looking at ocean color and

Plankton and most recently it launched a

ride share mission of its own

transporter 10 that was its first launch

from California this of course coming up

on the

second and after liftoff and about a

little over eight minutes into this

Mission it will land on the Drone ship

of course I still love

this will be the 88th landing on this

drone ship if successful and the 293d

booster Landing to date creeping up on

the big 300 for

SpaceX it's been a very busy year for

them in total this is launch number 34

if you can believe

it coming up in just over 10 minutes

from now we're about 3 minutes away from

the engine chill down sequence

thermally conditioning those Falcon 9

first stage

engines taking a look back at the live

chat here I want to thank Astro Joe one

of our wonderful channel members as well

as a fabulous moderator here for giting

us space light now membership thanks

Astro Joe appreciate all you

do want to

thank losos for a $5 Super Chat thank

you losos Jeffrey CIS for a $2 Super

Chat CH thank you Jeffrey really

appreciate it and Jack Wagner for a very

generous $20 Super Chat thank you so

much Jack for supporting the channel at

that level man it's very kind of

you also want to thank Astro Jen for

helping out with the moderation duties

tonight as well as Stephanie

B well I don't see him here at the

moment I'll just give a ubiquitous shout

out to Rusty Shackleford as well one of

our other Channel moderators appreciate

all of y'all for helping us out with

these live streams does not go

unnoticed we're now T minus 8 minutes 43

seconds away from plan liftoff of these

21 Starling satellites this is what they

look like in their launch

configuration I see our Adam Bernstein

while he has got the camera put us for

tonight helping us with moderation in

the live chat as well and I will Echo

his comment here asking you to help us

grow by hitting the like button and yes

each does

help amplify the exposure for more and

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channel just a little over 195,000

subscribers so far love to see get up to

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the next few days I think we can reach

that goal between this the bandwagon One

mission and of course the finale of the

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community cruising on into T minus 7

Minutes 5 seconds and counting couple

seconds away from that engine shill as

mentioned there are 21 Starling

satellites on board this particular

Falcon 9 flight each of them clacking in

at about

1,760 lb it's about 800 kg once their

solar panels unfur they have a wingspan

of about 100 ft or 30

m they use argon Hall thrusters for in

orbit Maneuvers as opposed to the

previously used Krypton Hall thrusters

they're built in Redmond Washington near

Seattle be deployed at about 180 M or

290 km altitude above the Earth's

surface at a 53° ree

inclination photo that you're seeing

here on your screen

is about as good of an image as we have

of a starlink V2 mini satellite deployed

on orbit this picture coming to us from

hoo robotics captured last year of a

starlink in a little less than a minute

we should be getting some video from

SpaceX so before we do let's quickly

step through the launch timeline after

the Falcon 9 lifts off from the

pad it'll pass through Max Q with the

point of greatest aerodynamic pressure

on the vehicle little more than a minute

out that's followed by a few events in

Rapid succession first first stage

managed cut off or M at about 230

followed up by stage separation and then

second stage engine ignition or

scs1 payload fairing jettison a little

after 3 minutes that's followed by the

first stage entry burn about 6 minutes

10 seconds that burn lasts about 20

seconds first stage Landing burn begins

just shy of the 8 Minute Mark I'll set

up a Landing at about 8 minutes and 17

seconds second stage engine cut off

happens before uh the 9 Minute Mark here

it goes into a parking orbit till about

t plus 53 minutes 33 seconds quick 3se

second burn setting up starlink

deployment 1 Hour 2 minutes 28

seconds and with that we'll go ahead and

bring you these gorgeous sunset fuse of

the Falcon 9 rocket as we are preparing

for what looks to be a very lovely

sunset launch

tonight now tus 4 minutes in counting in

real time

the slight discrepancy here between our

countdown clock and what you see from

SpaceX ours is in real time the SpaceX

feed coming in on a slight

delay you're seeing the strong back

retract sequence there as the strong

back or the transporter erector is

reclining 13 degrees away from the

falcon9

rocket want think a few more folks as

we're closing on in the last few minutes

here

our thanks to Dennis Randol for a $2

Super Chat Linda fiml for a $2 Super

Chat as well checking in from Santa

Barbara Eric Dilla with a $10 Super Chat

thank you so much Eric saying thanks to

Jenny toia will'll be watching from

Victorville wow starlord with the very

generous $20 Super Chat thank you wow

Star-Lord so we're passing the three

minute Mark here stage one lock SL is

complete I was just about to say first

stage liquid oxygen tank now fully

loaded in less than a minute we should

hear the call up for the same on the

Falcon 9 second

stage thanks to wow starlord though for

a very generous $20 Super Chat thank you

wow for supporting us that level wumpy

with a $5 Super Chat asking are the

Starling satellites already turned on

not exactly in the sense that I think

you're asking they

will um be activated and checked out

once they're on

orbit that said they are likely on

internal power they just go through a an

on orbit checkout phase once they've

actually

deployed coming up on two minutes in the

count

go through just these last couple of

super chats here

Jerome mcil 15 with a $5 Super Chat

thank you Jerome saying it's the first

time I've known about a launch ahead of

time I'm in So cal and so excited which

is always fabulous to

hear Sir Jeffrey CLA thank you for

joining us with Channel

membership and I'll make this complete

last one for now now uh Jackie Yates

with a very generous $20 Super Chat sing

out hopes for a bright future we'll come

back to the rest of the super Chats on

the other side of the launch we're

seeing here as the ground gas close outs

as everything appears to be on track for

This brilliant

Sunset Falcon preparing to take flight

in just over a

minute if you haven't already be sure to

hit the like button allows more folks to

find their way in as we're cruising into

Falcon 9 launch at Sun set from sunny

and wonderfully cloudless

California Falcon 9 is in

startup and now 40 seconds out we should

hear the SpaceX launch director give

their go for launch

momentarily

LD go for

launch and with seconds go for launch

we're going to go ahead and step back

and listen to the final count from

SpaceX let's listen in 14 seconds out in

real

time T minus 15

seconds t- 10 9 8 7 6 5

4 3 2 1 ignition and lift off of Falcon

9 go SpaceX go

starlink vehicle is pitching down

range stage one propulsion is

nominal

and as you saw and are still seeing a

brilliant liftoff at the Falcon 9

rocket pulling away from the California

coastline on the Starlight 8-

Miss now coming up on one minute

flight

Falcon 9 is

supersonic Falcon 9 vehicle now

traveling faster than the speed of sound

on this

Mission Max

Q the call out Max Q balcon KN passing

through the point of greatest

aerodynamic pressure on the

vehicle coming up on those events in

Rapid succession that I mentioned a

little bit

earlier we see first AG manage and cut

off for moo in fact started t plus 2

minutes and 30 seconds that'll be

followed by stage separation 4 seconds

later second stage engine starter scs1

at about two plus uh t plus 2 minutes

and 41 seconds and then falcon9 Halo

fairing deployment at about 3 minutes

and 8 seconds into flight

just a great shot co 9 is following a

nominal

trajectory the edge of the atmosphere

there on the left hand side of your

screen it sounds like so far a nominal

burn of the Falcon 99's nine Merlin

engines coming up on

Mo less than 10 seconds now on the

SpaceX feed happening now real

time main engine cut

off stage separation

confirmed hand back

ignition and all great call out and some

great visuals of both the Falcon 9

second stage and first stage as you see

the Hypersonic grid fence deploying on

the first stage booster tell number

b1081 in the SpaceX

Fleet those bursts you see there just

beyond the grid fins those the cold gas

thrusters fairing separation

confirmed and you see the payload

fairing are following nominal

trajectories away and the Starling

satellites exposed to the vacuum of

space for the first time again if you're

just joining us you're watching the

Flight of the starlink 8-1 mission very

much in progress so far following a

nominal flight

path this launch of starlink satellites

also includes a batch of six that

feature direct to sell capabilities a

new addition to the starlink fleet and

operational

capability bringing the total up to to

12 so

far the first six launched back in

January they've gone through a number of

testing and checkouts of the direct to

cell

operations SpaceX reports that they're

getting good results from those so far

and so they're adding another six to the

fleet now coming up on four and a half

minutes into this launch the next

Milestone we're expecting to see is at T

Plus 6 minutes and 10 seconds that'll be

for the first stage entry burn that burn

lasting about 20

seconds slowing down the Falcon 9 first

stage

booster in preparation for its Landing

burn which will come about a minute and

a half after

that

now coming up on 5 and a half minutes

into

flight

so far everything appears to be going

smoothly for SpaceX this

evening we're about 30 seconds away from

the start of the entry burn beginning in

real time the time you want to watch

those at the bottom of the screen coming

from the SpaceX

feed great shot of the Shadow there on

the Falcon at first