(This story has been updated with new launch target and weather forecast information.)
In another post-midnight launch, SpaceX is targeting Tuesday, July 8, for an early morning Falcon 9 rocket liftoff from Florida’s Space Coast.
This Starlink 10-28 mission will lift another payload of 28 broadband satellites on a northeasterly trajectory into low-Earth orbit. Target liftoff time: 4:21 a.m.
A Federal Aviation Administration operations plan advisory listed the launch site as pad 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center — but indicative of a recent pattern with those federal advisories, the Falcon 9 will instead lift of from nearby Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station.
The National Weather Service forecast for Monday night-Tuesday morning calls for a 30% chance of showers and thunderstorms, mainly before 2 a.m. Mostly cloudy skies should otherwise prevail, with a low near 75 and southeast wind of 5 to 10 mph.
SpaceX’s upcoming Falcon 9 mission will clock in as the 59th orbital rocket launch thus far during 2025 from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station and KSC.
Looking to the future, Space Force officials announced SpaceX was awarded $81.6 million to launch the USSF-178 mission during the first half of the 2027 fiscal year.
This includes the Space Force’s Space Systems Command’s Weather System Follow-on-Microwave Space Vehicle 2 — or WSF-M2 — which will deliver improved global sensing for weather-prediction models. The mission also includes BLAZE-2, a collection of Department of Defense small satellites for operational, research, development and prototype purposes.
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Rick Neale is a Space Reporter at FLORIDA TODAY. Contact Neale at Rneale@floridatoday.com. Twitter/X: @RickNeale1