SpaceX sends 22 new Starlink satellites into orbit in 60th launch of 2023

Sept. 1 (UPI) -- Twenty-two new Starlink Internet satellites started orbiting the Earth after a successful launch by SpaceX late Thursday night from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station.

The satellites, part of the constellation being created by SpaceX to provide Internet access even in the most remote locations on the globe, were taken into space by the workhorse Falcon 9 rocket at 10:21 p.m. EDT.

In what has become common for SpaceX, the first stage safely returned to Earth, nailing its landing on the drone ship A Shortfall of Gravitas in the Atlantic Ocean some 8 minutes after liftoff.

The launch was SpaceX's 60th blastoff of the year, one shy of its own record of 61 set by the private space agency that was set just last year.

Officials feared that weather could play a factor in Thursday's launch with the 45th Weather Squadron at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station suggesting that there was only a 20% chance of favorable weather at the opening of the launch window as Tropical Storm Idalia moved along the East Coast.

Those odds, though, improved to 60% by the end of the window just before midnight.

On Aug. 27, SpaceX launched its 5,000th Starlink satellites into orbit after sending 22 into space that night. That rocket also took off from the Space Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station.