SpaceX made Florida’s Space Coast home to the world’s busiest spaceport for a decade, but that will change this year. The company is significantly cutting the number of launches from Florida until Starship arrives, a senior SpaceX official confirmed Tuesday.
The Falcon 9 rocket has been SpaceX’s workhorse, routinely launching batches of satellites for the company’s Starlink network, primarily from launch pads at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station and NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. There were 165 Falcon 9 launches last year—about three flights per week—and about 75 percent of them carried Starlink satellites.
This year is different. SpaceX has launched more missions from its West Coast launch pad at Vandenberg Space Force Base in California since January, and this trend will amplify for the rest of the year.
All-in on Starship
A Falcon 9 launch early Tuesday was the last planned Starlink mission from Cape Canaveral until SpaceX begins flying Starship missions from Florida, according to Kiko Dontchev, the company’s vice president of launch. For at least the rest of the year, and maybe longer, this means the launch rate at the Florida spaceport will drop from eight or nine per month to perhaps two per month.
It wasn’t long ago when two launches per month was the norm, an indication of just how quickly SpaceX’s launch cadence has grown. Cape Canaveral and Kennedy Space Center sit on adjoining property and share the same range on Florida’s east coast, so it is worth considering them a single spaceport. The last time the Florida spaceport did not lead the world in space launches was in 2015.
“From here on, Starlink missions out of Florida will fly on Starship,” Dontchev wrote on X. “The West Coast team will continue regularly launching Starlink from Vandenberg.”
Tuesday’s launch was noteworthy for a couple of other reasons. First, it marked the 37th flight for SpaceX’s fleet-leading Falcon 9 first stage booster, a new record. The timing of the launch shortly before sunrise also allowed skywatchers up the East Coast to catch a glimpse of the Falcon 9 as it rocketed northeast from Cape Canaveral.
“Super proud of this incredible team,” Dontchev continued. “You’ve made Falcon 9 the most reliable launch vehicle in history. You also helped build the largest low-Earth orbit satellite constellation providing connectivity to millions around the world, and you’ve set the foundation for what’s next.”
SpaceX launched around 260 Starlink missions on Falcon 9 from Florida, but all future Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy launches from Florida will carry customer payloads. The next one is scheduled for August 30, when a Falcon Heavy rocket will lift off from Launch Complex 39A at Kennedy Space Center with NASA’s Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope. Next will be a Falcon 9 launch in mid-September to deliver the next four-person crew to the International Space Station.
Officials eventually plan to phase out the Falcon 9 in favor of Starship, at least for commercial missions, raising concerns among SpaceX customers about the availability of reliable launch services after 2028.
SpaceX is still holding to plans to begin launching Starship and Super Heavy boosters from Launch Complex 39A by the end of this year. That is unlikely, given the amount of work remaining to prepare the site and the lack of indication of any imminent plans to transport Starships from SpaceX’s operational factory in South Texas to Florida. A Starship debut from Kennedy Space Center by mid-2027 seems more likely.
Starship is sized to launch up to 60 Starlink Version 3 satellites, which are larger, heavier, and more powerful than the Starlink V2s flying on Falcon 9. SpaceX plans to use the next test flight of Starship, designated Flight 14, to launch the first Starlink V3s into low-Earth orbit from Starbase, Texas, as soon as next month.
