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Watch again as SpaceX launched more of its Starlink internet satellites to orbit on Thursday morning.
A Falcon 9 rocket – carrying 56 Starlink spacecraft – launched from Florida’s Cape Canaveral site soon after 9 am GMT (4 am local time).
The first stage of the Falcon 9 came back to Earth around nine minutes after liftoff and touched down vertically on a SpaceX droneship stationed in the Atlantic Ocean, hundreds of miles off the Florida coast.
Meanwhile, the rocket’s upper stage continued pushing the satellites to low Earth orbit and was expected to finish deploying all of them within 19 minutes.
Earlier this week, SpaceX completed one of the last major tests of its Starship rocket ahead of the first-ever orbital launch attempt of the Mars-bound craft.
Boss Elon Musk has said he is aiming for the flight test next month and if successful, it will be the biggest rocket launch in history.