Rocket launch today: Is there a rocket launch and when?

December 28: SpaceX launches 2 rockets today

SpaceX plans two rocket launches in the next 12 hours, one from California and the other from Florida.

The first launch is a Falcon 9 rocket launch Saturday 28 Decfrom Space Launch Complex 4 East at Vandenberg Space Force Base in California at 17:48 PST (8:48 EST, 0148 GMT). You can watch the launch on SpaceX’s X account and mission page starts about 15 minutes before departure.

This mission, called Starlink 11-3will launch 22 new Starlink Internet satellites into orbit for SpaceX’s growing mega-constellation. It will be the 16th flight for the Falcon 9’s first leg of the mission, with SpaceX hoping to recreate the scene by landing it on the Of Course I Still Love You droneship shortly after launch. Previous missions include 12 Starlnk launches, a Transporter-11 rideshare flight, SARah-2 and SDA-0A satellite missions.

The second launch of SpaceX will actually start on Sunday 29 Decbut the start time is 12:00 PM EST (0500 GMT)a midnight launch for the flight. You can watch the launch on SpaceX’s X account and mission page starts about 15 minutes before departure.

This mission is called “Astranis: From One to Many” and will launch four small “MicroGEO” communications satellites to provide connectivity on Earth to a variety of customers. Two satellites will provide in-flight connectivity for clients of Colorado-based Anuvu, one will serve a customer in the Philippines, and Astranis will use the fourth satellite as a so-called “UtilitySat for various clients.

This is SpaceX’s second attempt to launch the Astranis mission. A launch attempt on 21 December ended in an abort at the T-0 mark.

That was it for the rocket launches scheduled for today.

NOTE: SpaceX also plans to launch another 21 Starlink satellites, this time from Florida Monday 30 December at 12 ESTso we’ll get an update on that tomorrow. ALSO: An Indian space research organization’s Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle is scheduled to launch the new SpaDeX to test autonomous rendezvous and docking technology. It also carries 24 other scientific payloads for ISRO, universities and companies aboard its Poem-4 module. ISRO’s SpaDeX is scheduled for Monday 30 December at 11:28 AM EST (21:58 IST, 1628 GMT).