Watch live: SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket launches from California on U.S. spy satellite agency mission

e e e e good evening everyone and Welcome to our live coverage of the latest Mission from vanderberg space force base and Will Robinson Smith will be providing our commentary for the duration of this evening we are broadcasting as we always do from the space flight now news Bureau here at Nasa Kennedy Space Center our Stephen young is running the technical operations of our broadcast tonight once again our launch photographers Adam Bernstein and Michael Kane have tonight off given this is a West Coast launch but if you'd like to follow them you can find them over on X Michael's at MD Kane Jr and Adam at aurn NYC we are tus 27 minutes 19 seconds in counting away from spacex's second launch attempt of the day hoping to make it a double header from coast to coast first up to bat of course was the starlink 8-11 mission launching from keep canaval space force station and now less than 27 minutes will be the turn for nrol 113 this is the third launch of what the national reconnaissance office calls its quote proliferated architecture reporting from Reuters and others suggests that the payload on board this and the other quote unquote proliferated architecture missions for the nro are what SpaceX is called their star Shield satellites essentially a government and National Security bent version of the starlink satellites however important to note that the national reconnaissance office themselves given the nature of the mission has not commented and confirmed publicly that in fact these are star Shield satellites however worth noting that the timeline of the mission today is pretty darn similar to a standard starlink mission that we've seen recently so it seems to lend Credence to the reporting but again the National reconnaissance office just as a mostly a matter of policy is not commenting on either the payload or their suppliers reuter reports that the star Shield satellites are done through a partnership between SpaceX as well as North ran currently SpaceX is targeting a t0 liftoff of the mission at 8:20 p.m. Pacific uh daylight time that is 11:20 p.m. EAS e 0320 UTC as we're kicking things off certainly appreciate the nearly 3,000 of you who are watching live tonight if you haven't already you could do us a huge favor and click that like button allows the YouTube algorithm to bring this live coverage to more folks show that those of you who are here are engaged and hopefully we'll bring a few more people on in as we continue on with our live coverage we're also powered by a wonderful Channel member Community highlighted by our wonderful moderators Astro Joe Astro Jen kisty Lee appreciate you all being here this evening in fact as Joe marking 26 months as a channel member saying nice to join you for a launch at a reasonable time frame for kids and work again and isn't that just lovely want to welcome in some other members of our Channel member community so thanks to folks like Jeff Hansen Deborah ree fig 816 the rocket girl Patty chaile let's see who else we have tonight sure some other folks will cruise on in I see butterfly joining us Bubba Ray good to see you both Channel membership comes with a number of perks including discounts at our online shop shopspace now.com access to member only videos here on YouTube and of course the ability to watch all of our live launch liftoff moments from the cape in 4k I'll just note as far as a bit of programming over on our 24hour live stream channel that is Launchpad live in the four quadrant box there you can see in the bottom lefthand corner well I say you can see it's a little bit dark right now but that's where the Pegasus barge is currently situated now that it is arrived at the turn Basin at the Press site NASA will spend uh parts of Friday and Saturday offloading the components for the Artemis missions Artemis 2 three and four so be sure to keep an eye out on that channel for that offloading process which again will begin early tomorrow morning going to briefly thank see Kalisa Lee Jeff Hansen for both gifting five space flight down memberships of Peace appreciate the two of you and to our 10 news channel members welcome aboard we're glad to have you with us be sure to thank Lista and Jeff in the uh live chat if you haven't already speaking of Jeff marking 7 months as a channel member with us Jeff says go Vandy go SpaceX go Falcon 9 go n 113 speaking of the mission let's go ahead and talk about the countdown timeline here as SpaceX is stepping on through its countdown they have noted that fueling is in fact underway in this Falcon 9 rocket which means they're committing to a t0 at 820 p.m Pacific in the start of the window today if for whatever reason SpaceX is unable to move forward with this launch attempt for whatever reason may crop up potentially they do have a 24-hour backup opportunity essentially with a window that opens up at excuse me 7:58 p.m. Pacific back to the timeline now the call for fueling was made at about the team minus 38 minute Mark although SpaceX does their pole electronically so seems like they were in a good position to do so today it went ahead and made that call a little bit early but whenever the call is made fueling starts as you see on the screen is the tus 35 minute Mark with the loading of rp1 or rocket grade kerosene on board the Falcon 9's first and second stages and liquid oxygen on board the Falcon 99's first stage T minus 30 minutes they start loading Cen and helium on board the pressure vessels for the first stage helium is used to pressurize the main propellant tanks during flight that process begins the second stage a few minutes after that tus 23 minutes second stage rp1 load concludes and a tus 20 minutes and 50 seconds the most recent event that just happened it's when the strong back chill down process begins we see that visually as the so-called big vent that comes up about the T minus 20 minute 20 second Mark that sets up second stage locks though to begin at T-minus 16 minutes T-minus 7 minutes is when the chill down of the N9 Merin 1D engines gets underway that process involves flowing a small amount of liquid oxygen through the plumbing at turbo pumps helping to protect them from the risk of thermal shock and damage during the startup sequence about 6 minutes out the first stage kerosene tank is full then in T minus 4 and a half minutes the strong back retract sequence begins here at vanderberg starts the same the clamp arms opening up underneath the payload fairings but here at Vandy the transporter erector at a strong back reclines about 13 Dees away from the Falcon 9 rocket stays in that position until liftoff about 3 minutes out the first stage locks tank is full same is true on the second stage about a minute later at that point the Falcon 9 is fully loaded with 1 million pounds of propellant in the final 60 seconds when hear the call out for Falcon 9 being in startup it means control of the countdown is handed over from the ground sequence the Falcon's onboard flight computers the propelling tanks are being brought to flight pressure SpaceX launch director will give their go for launch at 45 seconds out the engine ignition command is issued at T minus 3 seconds and a fall N9 Merlins are healthy and ignite the command will be given for the hold down clamps to release the Falcon 9 for a t0o liftoff coming up at 8:20 p.m. Pacific 11:20 p.m. Eastern 0320 UT TC or in other words tus 18 minutes and 12 seconds e currently team minus 17 minutes 11 seconds in counting about a minute away from second stage lock load beginning let's go ahead and talk about where this Falcon 9 is going to fly once it leaves the pad let's talk a the little trajectory shall we this is going to feel very reminiscent of a star length launch lifting off from space launch complex 4 East over at vanderberg space Force Base similar to many of the starlinks we've seen fly from here Falon Knight's going to be heading in a southeasterly trajectory along the coast of California and Mexico as it makes its Ascent that orange track is the path of the first age booster after stage separation it will make an attempt to land on the Drone ship of course I still love you this will be the 20th Landing for this particular booster tail number 1063 in the SpaceX Fleet talk a little bit more about its history as we move on worth noting this will be the 100th Landing of a booster on this particular drone ship if successful tonight SpaceX also wants to recover the payload fairings saves about six million bucks per recovery effort they splash down in the Pacific Ocean Waters under this port of parachutes as you see demonstrated in this image on the right hand side of your screen this what it looks like as fairing Hales are brought board one of spacex's recovery vessels SpaceX isn't the process of working to certify both its fairing halves as well as its boosters for up to 40 flights each of course the closest they've gotten is 23 successful launches and 22 successful Landings b162 unfortunately bit the dust before it could proceed any further along that reusability path SpaceX still working on the Drone ship that uh bore the brunt of that Landing it's currently still docked at Pork naaval meanwhile the other East Coast's drone ship of course just read the instructions it was used for the starlink 8-11 mission earlier today and so it will start making its way back into Port over the next uh day and some change taking a look at the live chat want to thank the now more than 7,000 of you who are joining with us live appreciate you being with us on a Thursday evening hope you've all had a good work week and for those who've just gone back to school or maybe or a couple weeks in hopefully the new semester or quarter trimester however your school or university is calling him hopefully it's all going well for you want to welcome in a few new channel members welcome to James Fally joining us with membership at the pad leader level Sarah Jones clocking in at these spacecraft Commander level really appreciate that level of support Sarah and a welcome to Meg MC Gilroy joining us at the pad leader level so welcome aboard to the three of you we're very glad to have you with us and a big thanks to Cindy Sawyer for a very generous $20 Super Chat really appreciate you supporting us to that level Cindy who's given a shout out to the rest of the Sawyer family especially John hello John and I welcome as well to skipping dog one joining us with membership at the mission specialist level realized I neglected to mention this earlier but if you have a comment or question as well you like to pass along in your comment or question ideally relevant to space flight is uh appropriate to be on the show we'd love to bring you into the conversation give us some interesting things to talk about as we continue on through the count and you'll also be supporting what we do here at space flight now and that is always greatly appreciated just taking a look at some of the comments in the live chat uh James must have joined a little bit later in our starlink coverage this morning I was very very much present at the beginning of our coverage and then SpaceX likely due to weather punted the launch time of that mission by about 3 hours so unfortunately I had an assignment to attend to over at uh you happen to see some of our behind the scenes photos if you're a member of the Discord over at launch complex 39b some aremis related stuff so keep an eye on the channel for some of that coming into the not too distant future but you were in the more than capable hands of my colleague in space line now editor Stephen young so it's so always reassuring to know that I can step aside as do what he calls and y'all are in more than capable hands speaking of capable we are team minus 11 minutes 17 seconds in counting SpaceX is going to be launching this booster right here till number 1063 for a 20th time with this Mission so while we've got some time let's go ahead and run down its flight history to date while we still have the time to do so first launching back on November 21st of 2020 with the Sentinel 6 Michael Fric mission this was a radar altimeter that was developed in Partnership between NASA and EU metat Michael frck was the former director of NASA's earth science division that was followed up on May 26 of 2021 with the starlink l28 mission followed up by a planetary defense launch that was NASA's Dart or double asteroid redirect test mission sent to see if we could change the trajectory of an asteroid and spoiler alert we can that'll be followed up actually later this year by a mission from the European Space Agency called Hera which is set to launch in October essentially a follow-up mission to take a close look at the asteroid impacted by Dart to look at that impact crater with a little more detail and specificity as well as the debris Cloud caused by that impact so look forward to that mission and the coverage we've got coming up for it as that develops following that was a string of starlink missions for this booster those were starlink 4-11 on February 25th 4-13 on May 14th 3-1 on July 11th of 2022 3-4 on August 31st 4-31 on October 28th staring 2-5 on February 17th that was followed up by a ride share mission called transporter 7 which launched on April 15th of 2023 next up was the Iridium next 9/1 web9 mission in fact there will be a one web 20 Mission launching the last of the satellites manufactured at the Airbus one web satellite facility here in Florida it's coming up a little bit later this year next we had the starlink 5-13 mission that was followed by the second flight for the space development agency's tranch zero constellation and then we are back to starlink land for this booster we've got 7-4 on October 9th 7-7 on November 20th 7-1 on January 24th 7-17 on March 11th 8-7 on May 14th and most recently starlink 9-3 on July 12th which of course brings us to the mission on top today and R 113 coming up in just about 7 and a half minutes e e e e which isur station e currently T minus 4 minutes 15 seconds in counting as you can see we're getting some live pictures now at the pad there at space launch complex 4 East the clamp arms underneath the payload fairings are opening up and you can see the transporter erector now reclining back next feeling Milestone of course will be the conclusion of first stage liquid oxygen load that's going to wrap up at about the T minus 3 minute Mark fueling on the Falcon 9 will conclude at about T minus 2 minutes taking a look at the live chat want to thank the now more than 177,000 of you who are joining with us live if you haven't already we'd appreciate if you could hit that like button as we're in the last few minutes before liftoff and being that this is a clear night at Vandenberg hopefully the weather is cooperating wherever you are in the southwestern United States you are able to get some good pictures or video of this Falcon 9 once it takes flight be sure to tag us on threads or Twitter love to see what you capture e do have confirmation of stage two locks load complete the vehicle is going to be start up in about 30 seconds the call for ground guest Closeouts which you can see here coming from the strong back want to quickly thank just couple of people for your support this evening thanks to ding bold for $5 Super Chat I'm Lita as well saying the thrill of it all and a thanks to Lori Jones Wilson for a $2 Super Chat as well have the call the Falcon 9 is in startup for less than a minute to liftoff so we'll come back to the live chat on the other side of liftoff SpaceX s they tracking no issues and we do have a go for launch on this Mission as we come into the final third 30 seconds let's go ahead and listen into the SpaceX feed for Final Countdown and liftoff we'll be back on the other side with some additional commentary let's listen in T minus 15 seconds T minus 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 ignition and lift off of Falcon 9 go nrol 113 vehicle is pitching down range stage one propulsion is nomal if you're just joining us Falcon 9 has successfully lifted off from space launch complex 4 East as you can hear on your screen and we are getting some awesome shots of as scent we've also heard a few call outs so far from Mission Control nominal power and Telemetry including that everything is looking nominal from both a power and Telemetry standpoint now in just a few moments we're going to Throttle Down the engin suic in preparation for Max q and with that call out we hear that Falcon 9 is moving faster than the speed of sound Max Q there's that Max Q call out as you may have heard us mentioned before Max Q is a critical flight Milestone because this is the and a good liftoff of the Falcon 9 so far at this point SpaceX is going to step into a few different events in Fairly rapid succession first will be first stage main engine cuto off coming up at t+ 2 minutes and 26 seconds that'll be followed a few seconds later by stage separation and then second stage engine start scs1 at t plus 2 minutes 36 seconds and then fairing deployment at the 3 minute Mark given that these are nro satellites I'm guessing SpaceX probably will not be showing upper stage views and yet do hear uh commentary from SpaceX commentator that there are no upper stage views as certainly thought was going to be the case less than 15 seconds away from MO there you see Mo you see State separation and the condition of that Merlin vacuum engine there go the deployment of the Hypersonic grid fins these are titanium winglets that provide and steering do have confirmation of fairing separation again because these are Naro satellite SpaceX is not providing upper stage views that's why they're sticking with the first stage booster in full screen here those bursts that you're seeing in between the grid fins those the cold gas thrusters which help SpaceX adjust the attitude or the positioning of the booster as it orients itself for a touchdown on the Drone ship of course I still love you coming up in a few minutes the next big milestone is coming up at t plus 6 minutes and 13 seconds just about 2 minutes from now fortunately the weather here in California much better than what we had over here in Florida today so an on time departure of the Falcon 9 is always a welcome thing that booster preparing to make its way back down the entry burn again starting at t plus 6 minutes and 13 seconds that burn will see the reignition of three of the engines on the Falcon 9's first stage as you watch the speedometer over on the bottom left hand corner of your screen you'll see that number drop rapidly as the entry burn gets underway you can see the first stage booster has reached its apogee the altitude meter also dropping as well this is a view from inside the inner stage looking up in the booster now less than a minute away from the entry burn beginning as we mentioned SpaceX will not only be endeavoring to recover this first stage booster using the droneship of course I still love you they're also looking to recover the payload fairings going up on that entry burn in just a few seconds good beginning of the entry burn this lasting about 20 seconds there's the conclusion of that entry burn next The Landing burn is coming up in just a little more than a minute it's coming up at the 8 Minute Mark T Plus 8 minutes the booster should touch down on the Drone chip of course of course I still love you about t+ 8 minutes 22 seconds doar recall that the stage 1 FTS has been safe to the flight termination system no longer needed at this stage in flight so far all moving nominally with this Mission as coming up on the landing burn now less than 30 seconds away the first stage now is transonic meaning it's traveling below the speed of sound you could see the speedometer bottom left hand corner of your screen continues to drop dramatically coming up on 10 seconds The Landing burn beginning Landing burn now underway you can see the throne chip on the right hand side of your screen and for a 20th time booster be 1063 is down safely on the torone ship here the call for mvac shut down on the second stage that is seo1 taking a quick look inside the control room at their headquarters in Hawthorne California and with the conclusion of that first burn of the upper stage it is now in a parking orbit where it will Coast until about t plus 53 minutes 47 seconds there will be a brief two second burn on that upper stage engine and that'll set the satellites up for deployment at a time that the n and SpaceX have not disclosed so we'll have to wait for confirmation of AO deployment from spasic and or the N whoever decides to publish that information first before we go ahead and pivot over to our mission stats do want to thank a few more folks for your support tonight it's very much appreciated thanks to channel member chat MTB for a $5 Super Chat says back again welcome back chat hope you've been doing well appreciate sausage for a $2 Super Chat you so much for your support tonight clisa Lee with a very generous $20 Super Chat thank you so much clisa who says just wanted to say hey while you were Miss will Stephen did an amazing job filling in appreciate you both Sak 69 thanks for gifting a space fide now membership and a welcome aboard to whomever was the recipient of that gift Haley Higgins hash Irish Haley saying uh before launch thanks so much uh can't wait to see from Oceanside California hopefully you were able to get some good views from down there Tom lobok or excuse me William lawx says uh Tom just caught I'm assuming caught a view of the rocket so that's good to hear appreciate the $10 Super Chat Cynthia Graves with a $5 Super Chat as well appreciate the word of thanks and a thanks to Chris for a $10 Super Chat appreciate you Chris kicking over to our mission stats that currently stand with a good lift off and landing of the first St booster tail number 1063 marking its 20th flight in the books this was also the 371st Falcon 9 launch to date the 86th falcon9 launch of 2024 this was spacex's 314th Falcon booster refight or the launch of a booster that has flown at least once this was spacex's 89th launch of 2024 including Falcon heavy mission in June and two Starship launches from down in southern Texas this was spacex's 121st orbital launch within the last 365 days the 89th from space launch complex 4 East and the 157th overall orbital launch from pad 4E moving on some recovery stats this was the 100th Landing of a booster on the Drone ship of course I still love you the 271st SpaceX drone ship landing and the 345th balcon booster Landing to date finally some industry stats this one one for the books this was launch number 30 from vanderberg space Force Base so far this year notable because with this launch we have now surpassed the 29 total missions that launched from vanderberg in all of 2023 so we are in new record territory on the Year this was the 93rd orbital launch from us soil so far in 2024 the 102nd orbital launch from a US rocket company and the 164th orbital launch from around the globe six orbital launch mishap so far this year here's where the pie chart currently stands us with 102 missions so far China with 41 Russia with nine Japan with four India with three Iran and the European Space Agency with two and North Korea with one to speak of and that'll close the books for a double launch day for SpaceX and for us really appreciate all of you who've been sticking with us for both live launch coverage opport unities of course the now big question mark for SpaceX missions becomes will they be able to find good enough weather to move forward with the polar's dawn Mission the for commercial crew member astronaut Mission set to lift off from the pad you see here live on your screen this is historic launch complex 39a where you can see the Falcon D rocket and crew Dragon resilience Still Standing Tall and eagerly awaiting their departure grew in good spirits by all accounts from their posts on social media as they are just waiting for weather to improve enough it's not so much the launch weather but rather the weather splash down when they are ready to conclude their five-day Journey just has not been cooperating unfortunately as we showed you earlier today during our Starling 8-11 Mission coverage the tropics are starting to get a little more active we are course the heart of hurricane season now and so that may cause a bit of an issue with finding a good enough stretch of weather for players da to move forward we'll of course keep you posted on any and all updates regarding that mission and when they are able to launch eventually those SpaceX and NASA do need to flip this PAAD from a falcon 9 to a falcon heavy configuration ation in order to support the October launch opportunities for NASA's Europa Clipper Mission takes about three weeks to turn the pad over or at least it has historically the senior director of NASA's launch Services Program says that SpaceX has been working to bring down the timeline for converting from one configuration Falcon 9 to Falcon heavy down from 25 days but TVD exactly how many they will actually need this go around and again if you're not already subscribed to space flight now here on YouTube now's a good time to do so keep up with all of our videos coming down the pike as well as of course all of our live launch coverage opportunities with that I want to thank our space l now editor Stephen young for running the technical operations of this broadcast taking over commentary duties Last Broadcast want to thank our wonderful moderators in the live chat shout out to Astro Jen Astro Joe and Kalisa Lee Stephanie B was helping out earlier today so thanks to her as well as to Rusty Shackleford over on Launchpad live mostly want to thank you for wherever you watching from tonight hope you've had a good and productive day and are ready to get back at it tomorrow we are very close to the weekend I know you can do it so for all of us here at space flight now I'm Will Robinson Smith remember be good to yourselves be good to others and we will see you next time folks and until then bye-bye e