SpaceX launched three telecom satellites to Medium Earth Orbit aboard a Falcon 9 rocket from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station on September 13, 2026. The milestone flight marked the 700th mission for the Falcon rocket family, completing SES’s O3b mPOWER constellation.
What began in March 2006 with the modest flights of the Falcon 1 has grown into one of the most prolific commercial rocket families in aerospace history. When a Falcon 9 lifted off from Florida’s Cape Canaveral Space Force Station today at 2:49 p.m. EDT (1849 GMT), carrying the final three satellites for Luxembourg-based SES’ O3b mPOWER constellation, it marked the 700th overall mission for the Falcon rocket line according to the company.
The Falcon 1 flew a total of five times, twice successfully, before giving way to the workhorse Falcon 9 in 2010. The Falcon 9 has conducted the vast majority of the family’s flights; the only other member, the still-active Falcon Heavy, has launched 13 times to date.
Completing the O3b mPOWER Constellation
Carried inside the payload fairing were the final three spacecraft for Luxembourg-based SES and its O3b mPOWER network. Built by Boeing, the O3b mPOWER satellites weigh about 3,750 pounds (1,700 kilograms) apiece, and SpaceX has launched all of them on six Falcon 9 launches beginning in December 2022. The trio completed a journey to medium Earth orbit (MEO), where they were deployed as scheduled, being released at an altitude of 5,000 miles (8,000 kilometers) over a 14-minute span starting roughly 33.5 minutes after launch.
SES already operates 10 O3b mPOWER satellites in MEO. The spacecraft that went up today will complete the constellation, which is purpose-built to deliver predictable low latency, exceptional throughput and unprecedented flexibility for industries where uptime isn’t optional, according to the company.
According to the company, it transforms how networks operate by pairing advanced software defined satellites with an intelligent ground and software ecosystem — ensuring guaranteed performance, even as global bandwidth demands surge.
Booster Recovery and Heavy Flight Cadence
Following stage separation, the Falcon 9’s first stage came back to Earth a little less than nine minutes after launch today, landing in the Atlantic Ocean on the SpaceX drone ship A Shortfall of Gravitas.
It was the 29th flight for this particular booster, which is designated B1080.
The rocket’s upper stage, meanwhile, continued hauling the O3b mPOWER trio to medium Earth orbit (MEO). Today’s launch was SpaceX’s 107th orbital mission of the year, with the Falcon 9 having performed 105 of those flights and the Falcon Heavy conducting the other two. The company’s relentless launch pace is underscored by operations on both American coasts, including a separate milestone mission from California’s Vandenberg Space Force Base earlier in the quarter.
During that West Coast flight on Wednesday (Aug. 19) at 12:01 a.m. EDT (0401 GMT; 9:01 p.m. on Aug. 18 local time), a Falcon 9 carrying 24 of SpaceX’s Starlink internet satellites to low Earth orbit marked SpaceX’s 100th mission of the year overall—hitting the century mark for the third year in a row, following the 97th Falcon 9 launch of the year.
That mission’s first stage came back to Earth about 8.5 minutes into flight as planned, landing in the Pacific Ocean on the drone ship Of Course I Still Love You.
It was the 12th mission for that particular booster, which is designated B1097. B1097 is no stranger to milestone flights, having previously launched Sentinel-6B, Twilight, NROL-172, Transporter-17, and 7 Starlink missions, and having performed the 600th landing of an orbital rocket in SpaceX’s illustrious history during a Starlink launch this past April.
Scaling Toward Starship Integration
The vast majority of SpaceX’s launches this year — at the moment, 74 of them — have been devoted to building out the Starlink megaconstellation, which currently consists of nearly 11,000 operational satellites. The prolific flight tallies of recent years—including 138 missions in 2024 (132 by Falcon 9, two by Falcon Heavy and four by Starship) and 170 in 2025 (165 by Falcon 9 and five by Starship)—reflect a commercial launch cadence dominated largely by building out this infrastructure.
Yet these workhorse Falcon vehicles represent a transitional chapter in the company’s long-term roadmap. SpaceX founder and CEO Elon Musk has said the company wants to launch Starship multiple times per day, boosting annual tallies to 1,000 or so, with Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy not part of this longer-term picture as SpaceX wants to phase them out and have Starship shoulder the load.
As SpaceX has also launched two suborbital test flights of its Starship megarocket in 2026 and is gearing up for the third, which apparently will take the giant vehicle orbital for the first time, the aerospace giant continues to rely on its veteran Falcon rockets to finish critical commercial infrastructure like the O3b mPOWER network.
