SpaceX One Web Launch

Описание: Forty more OneWeb internet satellites rocketed into orbit from Kennedy Space Center at sunset Thursday, the company’s first launch with SpaceX after suspending flights on Russian rockets earlier this year.

Following a spectacular sunset blastoff at 5:27 p.m. EST (2227 GMT) Thursday, the Falcon 9’s upper stage headed into a roughly 373-mile-high (600-kilometer) polar orbit to deploy the 40 OneWeb satellites, while the first stage booster returned to Cape Canaveral for landing.

The launch was delayed from earlier in the week as SpaceX prepared the Falcon 9 launcher inside a hangar a quarter-mile south of pad 39A.

The 40 satellites on-board the Falcon 9 rocket brought the total number of OneWeb spacecraft launched to 504. OneWeb needs 588 operational satellites to complete its first-generation broadband network, or a total of nearly 650 spacecraft when counting spares.

Adding more relay stations to the constellation extends the network’s reach. OneWeb already provides internet services to communities in Alaska, Canada, and and Northern Europe where terrestrial fiber connectivity is unavailable. The 40 satellites launched Thursday will put Southern Europe, the United States, North Africa, the Middle East, Japan, and parts of Australia and India within OneWeb’s reach.

“This launch is very, very important for us because it’s going to allow us to increase significantly the coverage of our service,” said Massimiliano Ladovaz, OneWeb’s chief technology officer. “With this launch, we’ll be able to cover up to 25 degrees north and south (latitude). This means the entire United States, and half of Australia down, and (much of) South America.”

In a pre-launch interview with Spaceflight Now, Ladovaz said the OneWeb satellites already in orbit are performing well. OneWeb’s satellites are built in a factory just outside the gates of Kennedy Space Center by a joint venture between OneWeb and Airbus Defense and Space. The satellites are designed to beam low-latency broadband internet signals to customers around the world.

“Our failure rate is very, very, very low,” Ladovaz said. “I think it’s probably less than 1%, and we want to keep it that way, even lower than that. The satellites have had very few issues.”