Star Tech: Elon Musk's SpaceX Rocket Blasts Off With 88 New Satellites

Star Tech: Elon Musk's SpaceX Rocket Blasts Off With 88 New Satellites

This is the moment a SpaceX rocket takes off with another 88 satellites for different organisations in its cargo bay.The SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket launched from the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in the US state of Florida at 3.31 pm on Wednesday.In the company’s second ‘rideshare’ mission, satellites were delivered in orbit for a number of government departments and commercial clients, including NASA, the microsatellite manufacturer ICEYE, and three for SpaceX's Starlink internet constellation.After blasting off, the Falcon 9's first-stage rocket booster fell back to earth and landed on a ground pad so it can be worked on and reused for future missions.SpaceX says it can make space travel cheaper by reusing flight hardware and the booster on Wednesday’s launch was also used on seven previous blast offs.Meanwhile, the Falcon 9’s fairing, the domed cap on top of the rocket that protects the satellites during blast off, was also used on previous launches.Earlier this year, SpaceX began carrying out ‘rideshare’ missions for their customers.The rideshare missions see the company’s rockets loaded with small satellites belonging to a range of SpaceX clients.By transporting batches of small satellites, otherwise known as smallsats, into orbit, SpaceX is able to take advantage of the booming market for smallsat launches.