For the 300th time this year, a rocket has lifted off for low Earth orbit.

SpaceX on Thursday (Dec. 11), launched its Falcon 9 rocket carrying 29 Starlink satellites from Space Launch Complex 40 (SLC-40) at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida. The broadband internet relay spacecraft entered Earth orbit about eight and a half minutes after leaving the ground at 5:01 p.m. EST (2201 GMT).

The Starlink satellites (Group 6-90) were on track to be deployed into the SpaceX megaconstellation about an hour into the flight.

Crew-8 | Polaris Dawn | CRS-31 | Astranis: From One to Many | IM-2 | Commercial GTO-1 | 8 Starlink missions

The Falcon 9's first stage (Booster 1083) completed its 16th mission, landing back on the autonomous droneship "Just Read the Instructions," stationed in the

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