Update for 6:30 p.m. ET: SpaceX is now aiming for a launch time of 7:30 p.m. EDT (0130 GMT).
SpaceX will send Turkey’s first domestically produced communications satellite to orbit today (July 8), and you can watch the action live.
A Falcon 9 rocket is scheduled to launch the Turksat 6A spacecraft today from Florida’s Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, during a four-hour window that opens at 5:21 p.m. EDT (2141 GMT).
However, there’s just a 30% chance that the weather will cooperate today, according to SpaceX. If Mother Nature forces a scrub, the next opportunity will come tomorrow, during a four-hour window that opens at 5:20 p.m. EDT (1920 GMT). Whenever the mission launches, SpaceX will stream it live via its account on X, beginning about 15 minutes prior to liftoff.
Turksat 6A is Turkey’s first fully homegrown communications satellite, according to the Hürriyet Daily News.
“Turksat 6A will widen the country’s satellite coverage and meet the television broadcasting needs,” the English-language Turkish newspaper reported, citing Abdulkadir Uraloğlu, the nation’s transport and infrastructure minister.
“India, Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia, which were not served by currently operating satellites, will be covered with Turksat 6A, reaching 5 billion people,” Uraloğlu said, according to the paper.
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The Falcon 9’s first stage will come back to Earth for a landing today, touching down about 8.5 minutes after liftoff on the Just Read the Instructions droneship, which will be stationed in the Atlantic Ocean.
It will be the 15th launch and landing for this particular booster, according to a SpaceX mission description.
The rocket’s upper stage, meanwhile, will continue hauling Turksat 6A toward geosynchronous transfer orbit, eventually deploying the spacecraft there 35.5 minutes after liftoff. Turksat 6A will then make its own way to its final orbit, where it will undergo a roughly month-long series of checkouts before entering service, Uraloğlu told the Hürriyet Daily News.
