On May 27 at 18:38 UTC the Starlink L28 mission launched atop Falcon 9 booster 1063 from SLC-40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida. This was only the second flight for Booster 1063, which successfully landed on the drone ship Just Read The Instructions.

If this seems like a low number of launches for a SpaceX booster, you’re right. Starlink missions usually use boosters that have flown many times. Boosters are assigned to missions months before liftoff and if something goes wrong — like the loss of a booster — there’s a bit of a shuffle to make sure all missions have a booster.  In this case, the loss of B1059 on the Starlink 19 mission back in February 2021 resulted in B1063 being reassigned from the Double Asteroid Redirection Test mission for NASA, which has been delayed until November 2021. In order for that to happen, 1063 was trucked across the country from Vandenberg Space Force Base in California to the Cape for use in Starlink missions.

Both fairings were recovered, one making its fifth flight and the other its second. All 60 satellites were successfully deployed into orbit.

More Information

Launch discussion thread (Reddit)

DART Launch Moves to Secondary Window (NASA)

Launch video