After a delay of a few days, SpaceX successfully fired the Falcon 9 B1049 statically at Kennedy Space Center’s Pad 39A – now at 6:19 a.m. EST (11:19 UTC) becoming the company’s second eight-flight booster .
Originally planned The Falcon 9 B1049’s static fire test, which took place on Friday, January 29, was delayed for unknown reasons, then cut off until late in the countdown on the 30th before SpaceX could complete the test on Sunday afternoon. Pending official confirmation that test results were positive, B1049 should now be on track to launch SpaceX’s 17th batch of Starlink v1.0 satellites (and 18th dedicated Starlink mission in total) this Tuesday.
The Just Read The Instructions (JRTI) drone vessel is being towed by tug Finn Falgout and is en route to a landing zone approximately 630 km (390 miles) northeast of Cape Canaveral after a partially aborted departure (the loop is visible below). The ships should arrive on site within the next ~ 24 hours to support Falcon 9 B1049’s eighth landing attempt.
At the same time, the tug Lauren Foss departed Port Canaveral on January 30 with the drone vessel Of Course I Still Love You (OCISLY) in tow, heading for a recovery area more or less identical to JRTI’s destination. OCISLY will support Falcon 9 booster B1059’s sixth launch and landing no earlier than (NET) 1:19 a.m. EST (06:19 UTC), Feb. 4, putting Starlink-18 into orbit just 42 hours after Starlink-17.
Stay tuned for updates as SpaceX gears up for an extraordinarily busy first week in February.
