Starlink Group 4-31 is launched by SpaceX's Falcon 9 from Vandenberg.

Friday, October 28, 2022 | Chimniii Desk

The 49th Falcon 9 flight lifted off from the Space Force Base in California with 53 Starlink satellites. The launch happened on (27th Oct at 6:14 PM PDT 28). The fourth shell of Starlink satellites is located at 540 kilometers in altitude. The B1063-8 booster successfully landed on the Autonomous Spaceport Drone Ship (ASDS). The second stage deployed the 53 satellites 15 minutes after launch. The second stage then conducts a final disposal burn before reentering the atmosphere over the North Pacific south of the Aleutian Islands.

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B1063 is based on the West Coast. Along with the others, B1063 is tasked to fly missions out of Vandenberg to polar and Sun-synchronous orbits. B1063 began its career with the Michael Freilich mission in November 2020. The Starlink v1 L28 launch and the recently concluded DART mission were supported by the booster. Starlink groups All but one of B1063's flights have been from the SFB, with the exception of the Starlink v1 L28 flight.

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The Starlink 4-31 mission brings the number of satellites launched to the fourth shell up to 1,583, while the total amount of Starlink satellites launched will rise to 3,558. There are 2,704 Starlink satellites in their operational space. 20 years from now. The number of Starlink satellites is impressive, but the constellation is still losing money according to Musk. He shared that a new version of the Starlink satellite is still needed to get the service to its intended reach and bandwidth.

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The Starlink system has been used in various natural and human-made disasters, including Hurricane Ian in south Florida. After requesting assistance from the Department of Defense in paying for the constellation's services to Ukraine, the company backtracked and offered to continue to pay for the Starlink deployment in the country. There is a full set of Starlink satellites. This controversy is not the only one that the Starlink constellation has gone through. After the first Starlink satellites were launched, it was realized that they were brighter than first thought. During the initial deployment phase, each satellite had a solar panel that was facing Earth.

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The Starlink v1.0 satellites were modified to include a sun shield that reduces the craft's brightness in the sky around sunrise and sunset by about a magnitude after a failed experiment with a dark sat. There are currently satellites being launched. standard with laser links. The sun shield interfered with the laser links. The company tried to make up for it by using a different coating on the satellite. The version 1 satellites are said to be brighter. The craft with the sun shield is not as bright as the original satellites.

The Starlink v2 satellites are larger and heavier than the 5 satellites on Falcon 9. Starlink v2 satellites are meant to be deployed by the upcoming Starship launch vehicle currently undergoing pre-flight tests at Starbase in south Texas. Payload bay is designed to accommodate larger Starlink v2 satellites. The Starlink v2 satellites will feature improved inter-satellite communication links, increased power, and greater bandwidth. The number of satellites that an F9 could take up at any one time would likely be reduced, though a new version of Starlink satellite using at least some of these features is being prepared that would be able to fly aboard the Falcon 9.

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Starlink v2 is being prepared to start flying next year. There are still five launches on the flight manifest. The next mission from the Kennedy Space Center is set to be the USSF-44 flight, and it will be a short break for the workhorse Falcon 9.

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