SpaceX launches 28 Starlink satellites days after service outage
July 26 (UPI) -- SpaceX early Saturday launched another 28 Starlink satellites into low-Earth orbit from Florida, days after a short service outage hit the space-based internet provider.
The Falcon 9 lifted off at 5:01 a.m. EDT from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station's Pad 40.
The first-stage booster launched for the 22nd time, including Crew-6 and 17 previous Starlink missions.
Watch Falcon 9 launch 28 @Starlink satellites to orbit from Florida https://t.co/lWkPbMccan— SpaceX (@SpaceX) July 26, 2025
About 8 minutes after liftoff, the booster landed on "A Shortfall of Gravitas" drone ship stationed in the Atlantic Ocean. It was the 119th touchdown on the droneship and the 480th to date for SpaceX in Florida and California.
This year, it was the 91st Falcon 9 launch, according to SpaceFlight Now.
There are more than 8,000 Starlink satellites in orbit, according to astronomer Jonathan McDowell.
On Thursday, Starlink users reported a rare full network outage of internet service. It began at 4 p.m. About 2 1/2 hours later, SpaceX announced most service had been restored. Then, 1 1/2 hours later, full service was back, Starlink reported.
"The outage was due to failure of key internal software services that operate the core network," Michael Nicholls, vice president of Starlink Engineering at SpaceX wrote on X. "We apologize for the temporary disruption in our service; we are deeply committed to providing a highly reliable network, and will fully root cause this issue and ensure it does not occur again."
There are more than 6 million Starlink customers worldwide, including 2 million in the United States after debuting in 2021.
The next SpaceX launch is scheduled for 8:55 p.m. PDT Saturday from Vandenbrug Space Force Station's Pad 4E in California. An additional 24 Starlink satellites are scheduled for deployment.
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