Take three!

After two reschedules due to high wind altitude and equipment review, SpaceX is on track to launch three satellites into non-geostationary orbit Thursday morning at 9:17 a.m. EST.

I know, I know, the headline said two satellites — the third amigo on this trip and the main payload for the mission is the Earth-observation satellite, Paz, operated by Spain’s Hidesat. According to their site, the radar technology will orbit the Earth 15 times a day while simultaneously capturing more than 100 images at 25cm resolution.

But back to Starlink — yes, there’s a theme here. Starman, Starlink, Battlestar Galacti —

SpaceX will launch the first two of 11,925 satellites into orbit as a part of their Starman project, which aims to provide global internet connectivity and access for those in remote areas. Some may remember a similar initiative in theory by Facebook’s Mark Zuckberg and his Internet.org project — Starman is far, far from that.

The prototypes, Microsat-2a and Microsat-2b will deploy from the Falcon 9’s upper stage shortly after Paz is released into the cosmos to begin it’s 5-year mission.

Eventually, Starlink will be segmented into two parts — 4,425 satellites will orbit the Earth roughly 700 miles up in the sky, with the remaining 7,518 satellites located 200 miles up. The end-goal here is to build a constellation of satellites that will provide a sprawling spider web of internet access around the world.

Watch it live!

Updates:

Successful launch and deployment of Paz satellite.

Starlink is live! You can tell because now they have names.

Thanks for reading!

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