SpaceX launched two Earth-imaging satellites today, further expanding the Maxar Technologies’ WorldView Legion constellation. The Falcon 9 rocket carrying the WorldView Legion 5 and 6 satellites lifted off from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center at 6:13 p.m. EST (2313 GMT).
The first stage of the rocket successfully landed back on Earth about eight minutes after launch, touching down at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. This was the fourth successful landing for this particular booster.
The upper stage carried the satellites to orbit, deploying WorldView Legion 5 approximately 49 minutes after launch and WorldView Legion 6 roughly an hour after that as planned.
Maxar representatives stated that the launch will complete the first block of their next-generation WorldView Legion satellites, enhancing the company’s high-resolution satellite imagery collection capacity.
The WorldView Legion spacecraft are capable of resolving features as small as 12 inches on Earth’s surface. This milestone marks SpaceX’s second launch of the day, following a previous Starlink internet satellite launch earlier in the morning.
A photo taken at 7:57 PM EST appears to have captured the last satellite deployment, with the timeframe not making sense and the photographer wishing for better skills.
Source: https://www.space.com/space-exploration/launches-spacecraft/spacex-launch-maxar-worldview-legion-5-6-satellites