A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket is set to liftoff from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station Sunday to add another batch of 23 Starlink V2 Mini satellites to SpaceX’s growing megaconstellation.
Liftoff of the Starlink 6-77 mission from pad 40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station is set for 4:57 p.m. EST (2157 UTC) with additional opportunities available until 8:27 p.m. EST if needed. The booster will take a south-easterly trajectory for this delivery to the Starlink constellation’s sixth shell.
Spaceflight Now will have live coverage beginning about an hour prior to liftoff.
The 45th Weather Squadron forecast pretty idyllic conditions at the pad during the launch window on Sunday afternoon. Meteorologists believe there’s a 90 percent chance of good weather at Space Launch Complex 40 (SLC-40), with liftoff winds and cumulus clouds being the primary concerns. However, launch weather officers also flagged the booster recovery weather as a watch item, listing that as a “moderate” risk.
If the launch delays a day, weather conditions drop to 80 percent favorable and booster recovery risk rises to the “high” level.
As of the 9 a.m. EST (1300 UTC) update from the National Hurricane Center, a storm categorized as “Disturbance 2” has a 10 percent chance of forming into tropical cyclone within 48 hours. The storm is parked just north of Haiti and the Dominican Republic and south of The Bahamas.
The SpaceX droneship, ‘Just Read the Instructions,’ is on tap to support this mission, stationed in the Atlantic west of the Bahamas. If all goes according to plan, this will mark the 96th booster landing for JRTI and the 362nd booster landing to date.
