Astronomy Picture of the Day: SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket launches record 12th mission, lands on ship at sea

 

A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket flew for an unprecedented 12th time Saturday (March 19) and came back down to Earth for yet another successful touchdown.

The two-stage Falcon 9 lifted off from Florida's Cape Canaveral Space Force Station at 12:42 a.m. EDT (0442 GMT) on Saturday, carrying 53 of SpaceX's Starlink internet satellites toward low Earth orbit. 

It was the 12th launch for this Falcon 9 first stage, setting a new record for SpaceX rocket reusability. The booster previously lofted the RADARSAT Constellation mission for the Canadian Space Agency in June 2019; SpaceX's first crewed flight, the Demo-2 mission to the International Space Station, in May 2020; the SXM-7 satellite for SiriusXM in December 2020; and eight other Starlink missions, SpaceX representatives wrote in a mission description.

https://www.space.com/spacex-starlink-launch-falcon-9-12th-flight