SpaceX is back in the skies! After a hiccup on Dec. 17 knocked one of its Starlink satellites out of action.
The company successfully launched the Starlink 6-88 mission from Cape Canaveral in the wee hours of Jan. 4.
Did a little bad weather slow things down? Sure — a nearly two-hour delay didn’t stop the Falcon 9 rocket from soaring southeast.
It delivered 29 Starlink V2 Mini Optimized satellites into orbit.
The December incident, which involved satellite 35956 losing contact just weeks after its launch, caused some concern.
“Additional data suggest a small number of trackable debris objects.
We expect the satellite and debris to reenter within weeks,” said Starlink VP Michael Nicolls.
Radar expert Ed Lu noted the fragments had already spread across 6,000 km of orbit — a reminder that space is anything but empty.
Starlink Expansion Continues
Sunday’s launch also marked the first Falcon 9 flight of 2026 from Florida.
It used a brand-new booster that successfully landed on the drone ship Just Read the Instructions — the 555th booster landing for SpaceX to date.
Starlink continues to expand rapidly: over 9,300 satellites now orbit Earth, with more than nine million global users across 155 countries.
Nicolls also confirmed plans to lower 4,400 satellites to reduce collision risks and prepare for Starlink Version 3.
He promised terabit-per-second speeds — 10 times faster than current satellites.
So, while one satellite stumbled, the megaconstellation keeps growing.
Proving that in space, as on Earth, setbacks are just pit stops on the road to orbit.
