A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket stands at Launch Complex 39A ahead of the launch of the Starlink 12-17 mission. Image: Spaceflight Now
SpaceX is preparing to launch a Falcon 9 rocket with its latest batch of Starlink V2 Mini satellites into low Earth orbit about an hour and a half after midnight on Friday.
The Starlink 12-17 mission is targeting liftoff from Launch Complex 39A at 1:24 a.m. (0524 UTC). This will be the 28th launch featuring the company’s internet satellites so far in 2025.
Spaceflight Now will have live coverage beginning about an hour before liftoff.
On Thursday, the 45th Weather Squadron forecast a 95 percent chance for favorable weather during the launch window. Winds will be relatively light, trending between 7-12 miles per hour.
SpaceX will use the Falcon 9 first stage booster, tail number B1083, to support this mission. This will be its 10th flight to space and back after previously launching missions, like the crewed missions of Polaris Dawn and Crew-8 as well as Intuitive Machines’ second Nova-C lunar lander.
A little more than eight minutes after liftoff, B1083 will target a landing on the droneship, ‘A Shortfall of Gravitas. If successful, this will be the 104th booster landing for ASOG and the 429th booster landing to date.
Among the 21 Starlink V2 Mini satellites are 13 that feature Direct to Cell capabilities. To date, SpaceX has launched more than 550 DTC Starlink satellites.
On Thursday, Michael Nicholls, the vice president of Starlink Engineering at SpaceX, shared that the DTC service was newly available to those in Japan in partnership with KDDI, a Japanese telecommunication operator, which has the “au” brand for its mobile phones.
The company said in a post on X that the service would be available to more than six million devices.
SpaceX is also continuing to expand the reach of its satellite internet service. It announced the addition of Guyana on Tuesday and Jordan on Wednesday.