SpaceX is planning for a surge of geostationary communications satellite launches right after quite a few sluggish decades.
In the late 2010s, orders of large geostationary commsats plummeted. Previously a mainstay of the professional start sector, western geostationary satellite launches became much rarer in 2019 and the early 2020s. That downturn was specially obvious for SpaceX, wherever geostationary transfer orbit (GTO) launches had been one particular of the most frequent missions done by its Falcon nine rockets from 2014 by way of 2018.
In its to start with 5 decades, SpaceX done 28 GTO launches for professional prospects. That interval culminated in 2018, when Falcon nine done 9 professional GTO launches in one particular yr. The sector then fell off a cliff as decades of scarce satellite orders arrived to roost. From November 2018 to Oct 2022, SpaceX done just 11 GTO launches. Only in late 2022 did its GTO start action start out to decide on back again up.
In the place of two months, SpaceX done 5 professional GTO launches, bringing its 2022 complete to 7. SpaceX’s Falcon Hefty rocket also done a pair of immediate geosynchronous launches for the US armed forces in November 2022 and January 2023. That resurgence of substantial Earth orbit launches is established to keep on in 2023.
SpaceX has up to 11 professional GTO or immediate-to-GEO satellite launches scheduled in 2023. Together with House Norway’s Arctic Broadband Satellite Mission satellites, which are headed to an unique substantial Earth orbit (GEO) in its place of GTO, SpaceX has a dozen GEO/HEO satellite launches prepared this yr. A Falcon Hefty rocket introduced the US armed forces’s USSF-67 specifically to geosynchronous orbit very last thirty day period, and one more Falcon Hefty is predicted to start the USSF-52 mission to GTO in the center of the yr.
Even if a handful of missions slip into 2024, 2023 could be the most prolific yr of SpaceX geostationary satellite launches at any time. Unofficial manifests show that SpaceX has one more 10 GTO launches scheduled in 2024, 2025, and over and above.
