SpaceX launched 27 Starlink satellites on Falcon 9 rocket from Vandenberg SFB

SpaceX launched another batch of 27 Starlink V2 Mini satellites from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California on Monday.

Liftoff from Space Launch Complex 4 East occurred at 4:06 p.m. PDT (7:06 p.m. EDT, 2306 UTC) on Monday, April 7. SpaceX confirmed deployment of the satellites about an hour after launch.

A little more than eight minutes into the mission, the Falcon 9 rocket’s first stage booster landed on a droneship stationed in the Pacific Ocean. It was the 124th successful booster landing for the droneship, ‘Of Course I Still Love You,’ and the 428th booster landing to date.

SpaceX debuted a new Falcon 9 first stage booster on this mission, B1093. This will be the second new booster that SpaceX introduced this year, following the launch of B1092 on the Starlink 12-13 mission on Feb. 27.

Through its system of refurbishment and reuse, SpaceX is aiming to introduce fewer boosters into its lineup over time and ramp up reuse with the goal of having booster be able to launch up to 40 times each. It launched six new boosters in 2024, four boosters in 2023 and six new boosters in 2022.

As of now, SpaceX has 18 Falcon boosters in its active rotation with 11 in use on the East Coast and seven on the West Coast.

SpaceX only has one booster currently that was previously used as a Falcon Heavy side booster and not re-flown as a Falcon 9 rocket booster, which is B1072. It and B1086 supported the launch of the GOES-U weather satellite, but the latter was converted to a Falcon 9 booster and launched again nearly six months later on the Starlink 12-5 mission.