SpaceX launched 28 Starlink satellites from California, with booster B1082 completing its 17th landing—SpaceX’s 137th orbital mission of 2025.
SpaceX launches 28 Starlink satellites; Falcon 9 completes 17th flight, expanding constellation
Photo Credit: SpaceX
On October 27, 2025, SpaceX sent 28 of its Starlink broadband-internet satellites up to orbit from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California. The launch was also good for the return of the first-stage booster - called B1082 - which came back to the company's drone ship in the Pacific. With this launch, SpaceX went even further in its record-breaking number of orbital flights for the year.
As per Space.com report, the Falcon 9 rocket rose from the Vandenberg pad at about 5:43 p.m. local time (00:43 GMT, October 28) carrying the new batch of Starlink satellites into low Earth orbit. After separation of the upper stage, the booster B1082 returned to Earth around 8.5 minutes after launch, landing on the drone ship Of Course I Still Love You — marking its 17th flight. The upper stage continued on to deploy the 28 satellites approximately an hour later.
This was the 137th flight of a Falcon 9 this year by SpaceX as well as the third launch in three consecutive days. Among these, 98 missions have been designated to assemble out the Starlink constellation, which currently exceeds 10,000 satellites launched to date, and of which about 8,750 are presently in low Earth orbit. The size and rate of the launch indicate the company's desire to reach a wider range of broadband coverage all over the world and emphasize the general transition towards more frequent flights of reusable rockets.
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