For SpaceUpClose.com & RocketSTEM

CAPE CANAVERAL AIR FORCE STATION, FL –  The 1^st ever 6x recycled SpaceX Falcon 9 first stage radiated bountiful beauty at blastoff Tuesday morning, Aug. 18 as it soared to orbit under sunny Florida Space Coast skies and set a new record breaking reusability record.

Liftoff of the ‘flight-proven’ SpaceX Falcon 9 booster B1049.6 took place right on time Tuesday, Aug. 18 at 10:31 a.m. EDT on its eleventh Starlink mission from Space Launch Complex 40 (SLC-40) at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida.

Enjoy our photos of the Falcon 9 launch gallery taken by the Space UpClose team of Ken Kremer and Jean Wright.

Check back as the gallery grows.

The now most experienced SpaceX rocket successfully deployed its packed payload of 58 SpaceX Starlink internet satellites and three of Planet’s Earth optical imaging SkySats as the third rideshare to low Earth orbit (LEO).

To top that off the SpaceX was able to successfully land the 6x flown 1^st stage booster for a sixth time on the ‘Of Course I Still Love You’ (OCISLY) droneship – thereby setting up a 7^th launch attempt at some point in the not too distant future.

SpaceX also successfully caught one of the payload fairing halves mid-air with the humongous net rigged on their ‘Go Ms Tree’ fairing catcher ship  – while the other was scooped from the Atlantic Ocean by the SpaceX fleet.

Enjoy our photos of the Falcon 9 launch and prelaunch from Space  Launch Complex-40 taken by the Space UpClose team of Ken Kremer and Jean Wright.

Check back as the gallery grows.

Watch my post launch commentary about the Aug. 18 Starlink, SkySat launch at Wesh 2 NBC News Orlando and WFTV ABC Channel 9 TV News Orlando

https://www.wesh.com/article/rocket-launch-planned-for-tuesday-morning/33633393

Watch my Aug. 14 guest host and Aug 3 interview appearances at ‘Stay Curious’ show at the American Space Museum about successful Mars Perseverance launch, successful splashdown SpaceX Crew Dragon on Demo-2 1st commercial mission as well as upcoming Crew-1, Artemis Moon mission, SpaceX Starlink and more:

https://www.facebook.com/SpaceWalkOfFame/videos/2690117104638099/

https://www.facebook.com/SpaceWalkOfFame/videos/594560917928307/

Watch Ken’s continuing reports about Commercial Crew and Artemis and onsite for live reporting of upcoming and recent SpaceX and ULA launches including Demo-2, Starlink, X-37B, Solar Orbiter, Mars 2020 and more at the Kennedy Space Center and Cape Canaveral Space Force Station.

Stay tuned here for Ken’s continuing Earth and Planetary science and human spaceflight news: www.kenkremer.com –www.spaceupclose.com – twitter @ken_kremer – email: ken at kenkremer.com

Dr. Kremer is a research scientist and journalist based in the KSC area, active in outreach and interviewed regularly on TV and radio about space topics.
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Ken’s photos are for sale and he is available for lectures and outreach events

SpaceX Falcon 9 vents LOX moments before liftoff on 11th Starlink comsat mission from Space Launch Complex-40 on Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, Florida on Aug. 18, 2020. Credit: Jean Wright/spaceupclose.com

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