SpaceX conducted its 500th successful Falcon 9 mission on Sunday, marking an impressive achievement for the company, which launched in 2002.
The Falcon 9 rocket launched from Cape Canaveral in Florida at 1:04 a.m. ET on Sunday, on the Commercial GTO-1 mission to deploy the Dror 1 geostationary communication satellite.
This was the 13th flight for the Falcon 9 first-stage booster supporting this mission, which previously launched Crew-8, Polaris Dawn, CRS-31, Astranis: From One to Many, IM-2, and seven Starlink missions.
After landing back on the Read the Instructions droneship stationed off the coast of Florida, the booster will now be checked over and refurbished ahead of its 14th flight.
Reusing rockets is core to SpaceX’s approach to spaceflight as it allows for more frequent launches and at much lower costs.
Earlier this month, one of its Falcon 9 boosters launched and landed for a record 29th time.
While many of the launches have deployed satellites for an array of private and commercial firms as well as government agencies around the world, most have been used to deploy small internet satellites for SpaceX’s Starlink program. It also uses the Falcon 9 for crew and cargo flights to and from the International Space Station (ISS), with the next crewed mission to the ISS expected to take place in just a few weeks’ time.
The SpaceX team is now applying what it’s learned from the Falcon 9 to its next-generation Starship rocket, which it’s already launched and landed several times in tests at the company’s Starbase facility in Boca Chica, Texas.
However, an explosion last month involving the upper-stage spacecraft put a dent in its progress, and the company has yet to announce plans for the 10th launch of the rocket, the most powerful ever to fly.
Once operational, the Starship, comprising the first-stage Super Heavy and upper-stage Starship, will be used for crew and cargo missions to the moon and possibly Mars, too.
