SpaceX is busy bringing astronauts home to one coast in Florida on Tuesday, but plans to send rockets from other coasts.
The Falcon 9, carrying the 23 Starlink satellite, is targeting the liftoff from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station’s Space Launch Complex 40 at 3:57pm in a launch window running until 6:09pm.
The first phase of the mission booster is the 19th flight, with recovery to droneships aiming for a shortage of Gravitas.
This is the 23rd release from Space Coast, with everything but one coming from SpaceX.
The recent launch of the Crew 10 mission from the Kennedy Space Center last Friday set for the return of another crew member who had been waiting for the International Space Station.
Crew 9 missions returning home with Crew Dragon Freedom will splash out from Florida’s Gulf Coast two hours after the release of Falcon 9, aiming for a splashdown at 5:57pm.
The spacecraft brings home three NASA astronauts and one Russian astronaut. Two of the four crew members flew to the station last September, while the other two have been on the ISS since last June. They are Boeing Starliner astronauts left at the space station when NASA decides to send Starliner home without a crew member.
Their return marks the end of 9 1/2 months in the universe.
Original issue: March 18, 2025 9:01am EDT
