This is “the greatest number” of satellites “ever deployed in a single mission,” according to Andy Tran, a SpaceX official.
A Falcon 9 rocket launched on Sunday carrying a record 133 commercial and government satellites as well as 10 SpaceX satellites, the company said.
The rocket took off from Cape Canaveral in Florida at 10 a.m. (3 p.m. GMT), 24 hours after the date initially scheduled for its flight which was postponed due to bad weather.
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UVSQ-SAT, the minisatellite of the University of Versailles aboard SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket
SpaceX flies Falcon 9 as part of a “rideshare” (shared launch) program in which smaller companies pay Elon Musk's group to carry their technology into space.
In a series of tweets, SpaceX confirmed that all 143 satellites have been deployed.
Falcon 9 launches 143 spacecraft to orbit - the most ever deployed on a single mission - completing SpaceX's first dedicated SmallSat Rideshare Program mission pic.twitter.com/CJSUvKWeb4
- SpaceX (@SpaceX) January 25, 2021
The company founded by Elon Musk wants to put thousands of small satellites into orbit to form the constellation dubbed "Starlink", which is to provide high-speed Internet from space.
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Scientists have for their part expressed their concern about the number of objects orbiting the Earth.
SpaceX, however, claims that its satellites are designed to burn up in the atmosphere after a few years.