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Journalism of Courage
SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket took off on the company’s 200th spaceflight on Wednesday from the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida. The mission, dubbed Transporter-6, carried 114 satellites, which is the second-highest number of satellites carried into space by a single launch vehicle.
Apart from the distinction of being SpaceX’s 200th flight, the Transporter-6 mission is also the company’s 161st successful rocket landing and the 15th mission for this particular Falcon 9 first stage. According to Space.com, the 114 satellites include cubesats, microsats, picosats and orbital transfer vehicles carrying spacecraft that are to be deployed at a later time.
As many as 36 of the satellites deployed by the Transporter-6 mission are “SuperDove” earth observation satellites developed and operated by San Francisco-based space technology firm – Planet. The SuperDove satellites are equipped with instruments that can deliver data to be used by public and private organisations in the fields of agriculture, forestry sustainability and other industries.
The Falcon 9 rocket was initially supposed to deploy all the satellites in 82 separate deployments, but only 78 of those have been confirmed. “Teams are continuing to review data for the remaining payloads, though it may take customers some time to provide additional information on the status of their payloads,” wrote the company in the mission description.
