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Six launches are expected from Florida, California, and French Guiana this week, with SpaceX scheduled to launch its Falcon Heavy vehicle for the first time since October 2024. Meanwhile, Falcon 9, Atlas V, and Ariane 6 are all expected to launch internet satellites for the Starlink and Amazon Leo constellations, and Falcon 9 will close out the week with a rideshare mission.

Over six months after the end of Flight 11, the old design, Pad 1, was demolished, and conversion to the newer pad design, like Pad 2, is underway. In that time, crews have made impressive progress, with excavation of the trench about to start.

Over the last two years, SpaceX has been constructing a completely redesigned launch pad for Starship, drawing on lessons learned from the first 11 flights. The new pad alongside Block 3 of Starship is a clean-sheet design that should help SpaceX move toward a much more reusable launch pad.

The first stage of Starship, the Super Heavy booster, has already undergone many changes during its development. This most recent design change, from Block 1/2 boosters to Block 3, is by far the biggest leap. This new design we are about to cover is a clean-sheet design built from the ground up, informed by lessons learned over the last seven years.

Starship Version 3 flew for the first time this week in a mission of several firsts, performing notably better than previous version debuts, demonstrating that the upgraded vehicle remains on track to become the workhorse Super Heavy Lift Launch vehicle for SpaceX. However, some issues require resolution before SpaceX returns to booster catches.

SpaceX and Chinese launches dominate this week’s launch manifest, which features six missions from five launch sites worldwide. Falcon 9 is scheduled to launch three Starlink missions from SpaceX’s California and Florida launch facilities. In China, a Chang Zheng 12B flew on its debut mission on Monday, with a Chang Zheng 8 and Chang Zheng 6A set to fly unknown payloads later in the week.

Stoke Space completed proto-qualification of the first stage of its Nova rocket at its testing site in Moses Lake, Washington, in early June 2026. This milestone paves the way for the debut of the medium-lift Nova vehicle targeted for the end of 2026 from the historic Launch Complex-14 (LC-14) in Cape Canaveral.

With the completion of Flight 12 about three weeks ago, all focus is now on Flight 13 and its vehicles, Booster 20 and Ship 40. To date, both have completed cryogenic proof testing and are now set up to complete static fire testing next.

Terran R, the heavy-lift vehicle currently being developed by Relativity Space, is reaching significant milestones ahead of a potential debut at the end of 2026. Integration of essential subsystems for the rocket’s second stage was recently finalized ahead of its transfer to NASA’s Stennis Space Center for testing. Additionally, structural work on the qualification article for the first stage is complete and is being prepared for testing, while the flight article is advancing through tank and thrust-structure integration.

This week’s launch manifest includes six orbital launches worldwide, including the first Pegasus XL launch since 2021. SpaceX dominates the schedule with three Starlink missions, the Starfall demonstration mission, and the SXM-11 mission — all of which are to fly on Falcon 9. Internationally, a Chang Zheng 7A launched an unspecified payload on Tuesday.