SpaceX introduces a rare new Falcon 9 booster for final launch in 2021

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SpaceX rolled out a rare new Falcon 9 booster for the company’s latest launch in 2021, highlighting how widespread the reusability of the company’s rockets is.

The mission – CRS-24, Cargo Dragon 2’s fourth International Space Station (ISS) resupply – will be SpaceX’s 31st launch of this year’s Falcon 9, easily surpassing the record-breaking 26 launches set by the company in 2020. However, the CRS-24 will only be the second time this year that SpaceX has launched a (new) Falcon booster that hasn’t been launched, meaning all 29 other missions (about 94%) have successfully relied on flight-proven missiles.

In other words, in less than five years, SpaceX has gone from completing its first Falcon 9 reuse (SES-10 – March 2017) to launching nearly 30 times in one year without a single new booster. The only other time SpaceX has flown a new booster this year was the CRS-22, which successfully launched the Falcon 9 B1067 and the new Cargo Dragon 2 capsule C209 in June.

🐉 @SpaceX’s Falcon 9 – with the Dragon spacecraft on top – was launched on the launch pad this morning in preparation for the 24th commercial resupply services mission.

Weather is now 30% favorable for takeoff on Tuesday, December 21 at 5:06 a.m. ET: https://t.co/oKlkf7l1Rp pic.twitter.com/DAQZJx6zIh

– NASA Kennedy Space Center (@NASAKennedy) December 19, 2021

Six months later, the Falcon 9 B1069 is scheduled to launch with another new Cargo Dragon 2 capsule – likely C211 (Eleventh Dragon 2) – to the International Space Station. Carrying nearly 3 tons (6,500 pounds) of consumables, station parts and science experiments, the Dragon is scheduled to lift off from the Kennedy Space Center (KSC) 39A board not before (NET) 5:06AM EDT (10:06) UTC) on Tuesday, December 21. However, the weather certainly looks unfavorable, and CRS-24 currently has a 70% chance of getting rid of poor conditions in Cape Canaveral and lowering into the Atlantic. The Backup Tire December 22 weather forecast currently predicts a 60% better chance of favorable conditions.

Regardless, when the CRS-24 is launched, it will set a number of milestones and set several new records for SpaceX. In addition to installing 31 record launches for SpaceX this year, the CRS-24 will also be the third Falcon launch in just 69 hours – less than three days. Prior to that, SpaceX’s triple launch record was set as recently as November 2020 when it launched three Falcon 9 Crew-1, Sentinel 6A and Starlink V1 L15 rockets just over nine days apart (~217 hours). If SpaceX can find a hole in the metaphorical cloud and launch on December 21, it will beat that record by more than three times.

In addition, including Starlink 4-3 and NASA’s IXPE mission, CRS-24 will be SpaceX’s fifth orbital launch in December 2021 — the first time the company has launched more than four times in a single month. Even more impressively, if CRS-24 launches before Thursday, December 23, it will be SpaceX’s fifth launch in less than three weeks. If not in December, it’s very likely that SpaceX may have trimmed its sixth launch in the last few days of the year. Instead, most SpaceXers will have their due leave before the start of 2022.

Incredibly, even excluding the Starlink missions, which made up more than half of SpaceX’s 2021 launches, the company has at least 39 commercial Falcon launches tentatively scheduled for 2022. If it wants to continue its regular Starlink launches in addition to its well-formulated statement Unprecedented, it won’t be long before SpaceX’s upcoming fifth launch month.

SpaceX introduces a rare new Falcon 9 booster for final launch in 2021

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