SpaceX launches the Italian radar star, and the first stage rocket is changed from the Falcon Heavy rocket

At 18:11 ET on January 31, spaceX Falcon 9 rocket launched the 2,200-kilogram Italian radar mapping satellite CSG-2 at the Cape Canaveral Space Force Base in Florida.

After the separation of the first and second stages, the first stage rocket landed at Landing Zone 1 at Cape Canaveral, the third launch and landing of the booster. The booster served as a bundled booster for the Falcon Heavy rocket on two launch missions in 2019. This is also the first time that the Falcon Heavy rocket bundle booster has been modified into the Falcon 9 booster for launch missions.

The launch was originally scheduled for January 27, but was postponed due to bad weather. On January 30, because a cruise ship sailed into the restricted waters off the coast of Florida, it could not make way for the launch in time, and the launch was postponed.

The launch is Falcon 9's fourth mission in 2022, following two launches of the Starlink satellite on January 6 and January 18, EST, and SpaceX's third single-launch mission, Transit-3, on January 13.

In 2022, SpaceX plans to launch 52 missions, equivalent to one launch every 7 days. SpaceX completed 31 launches last year. In addition to the payload, the launch frequency also depends on SpaceX's ability to renovate a sub-stage of Falcon 9 and build a new upper stage.

Musk said last December that SpaceX's current pace of refurbishment is not up to his goal, "The booster is not as fast and fully reusable as we would have liked, and so is the fairing," SpaceNews reported. ”

SpaceX's next-generation fully reusable transportation system, the Starship, reduces costs and increases capacity. Musk mentioned, "Theoretically, a starship could cost as much as $1 million, $2 million, or something like that per launch and put more than 100 tons of cargo into orbit." It's crazy. ”