THE NEW SPACE RACE: SpaceX rocket sets reuse record on 500th Falcon 9 launch.

SpaceX launched its 500th Falcon 9 rocket on early this morning (July 2) and broke its own reuse record in the process.

The milestone mission lifted off with 27 Starlink satellites at 2:28 a.m. EDT (0628 GMT) on Wednesday from Space Launch Complex 40 at the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida. The rocket entered space about nine minutes after leaving the ground and deployed the new units for SpaceX’s broadband internet network 55 minutes later.

On the way to orbit, the Falcon 9’s most-flown first stage, Booster 1067, separated from its upper stage and flew back to a landing on the drone ship “A Shortfall of Gravitas” in the Atlantic Ocean. It was the 29th successful recovery for this stage, three more than any other in SpaceX’s fleet.

Impressive. Now, if they can just work the gremlins out of Starship…