【Dear Utol (2025): Doctor, Doctor I'm Sick Episode 41】

It's make or Dear Utol (2025): Doctor, Doctor I'm Sick Episode 41break time for SpaceX.

The Elon Musk-founded spaceflight company is planning to launch a clutch of communications satellites to orbit aboard a Falcon 9 rocket on Saturday. This is the company's first launch since a Falcon 9 blew up on its pad during what should have been a routine test five months ago.

SEE ALSO: Elon Musk's SpaceX absolutely needs its satellite internet business to work

The September explosion grounded the company's rockets and hit its bottom line, forcing SpaceX's aggressive launch schedule to be pushed back. Musk called the investigation the "most difficult and complex failure" in SpaceX's 14-year history.

The company, with the help of multiple government agencies, got to the bottom of the issue that caused the explosion and was given permission to launch again for the first time since September.

Original image has been replaced. Credit: Mashable

With Saturday's launch, SpaceX effectively needs to prove that it can do what it does again -- successfully launch payloads into orbit while making inroads in making its vision of reusable rocket stages a reality.

"Simply enough, SpaceX will be helped by just having a successful launch with no problems," Bill Ostrove, an aerospace and defense industry analyst at Forecast International, told Mashablevia email.

"That will go a long way towards proving themselves again. The more launches in a row they can get without a problem the better," he said.

Mashable Light Speed Want more out-of-this world tech, space and science stories? Sign up for Mashable's weekly Light Speed newsletter. By clicking Sign Me Up, you confirm you are 16+ and agree to our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. Thanks for signing up!

Also, the rocket literally has a lot riding on it.

This Falcon 9, which is expected to launch from California's Vandenberg Air Force Base at , is carrying a grand total of 10 communications satellites to orbit for the company Iridium.

You can watch the live webcast from SpaceX starting at 12:34 p.m. ET in the window below:

Landing attempt

In addition to launching the satellites into orbit, SpaceX is also planning one of its signature vertical rocket landings on a drone ship in the ocean.

After launching the satellites on their way, the first stage of the Falcon 9 will turn around and come back down to Earth, hopefully landing on the company's drone ship in the Pacific Ocean.

If all goes according to plan, that landing should also be webcast in the window above. (Occasionally, the video feeds from the drone ship can cut out due to weather conditions.)

Before the accident in September, the company was really starting to get the hang of these complicated rocket maneuvers.

This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed.

In total, SpaceX has successfully returned six boosters back to Earth after launching various satellites and other craft to space for customers like NASA and private satellite companies such as Iridium.

These aren't just stunts, however. SpaceX eventually wants to re-launch these landed rocket stages in order to drastically reduce the cost of building rockets and sending them to space.

Traditional rockets are used once and then discarded into space after launch, but if SpaceX has its way, the company will be able to launch multiple missions using their landed rockets.

---

Featured Video For You

---

Fiery explosion sets back SpaceX and Facebook

---

• Deals
• Tech
• Science
• Digital Culture
• Life
• Social Good
• Shopping
• Games

• No Time for a Negative Peace
• A Week in Culture: Tom Nissley, Writer and Game
• The Burden of Home by Aaron Gilbreath
• Beach Towel Contest: We Have a Winner! by Sadie Stein
• New MIT report reveals energy costs of AI tools like ChatGPT
• TPR v. The New Yorker: Lucky and Good by Cody Wiewandt
• William Burroughs Catches Some Rays by Sadie Stein
• Our Café au Lait Cup—Now for Sale! by Sadie Stein
• How to Settle Down with Dystopia
• Delivering Chinese; Self

• Walruses Were Once Magical Creatures, Prone to Suddenly Falling Asleep
• Best deals of the day Dec. 7: Roomba i3+ Evo, Fire TV Omni Series, and Paramount+ subscriptions
• A New Museum Memorializes the Commercial World’s Biggest Failures
• The Case of the Purloined Portrait
• Reimagining Doestoevky’s “White Nights” As a Building
• 'Quordle' today: See each 'Quordle' answer and hints for November 13, 2023
• Tesla might sue Cybertruck resellers
• How Eleanor Perry Changed the Way We Saw Women in the Movies
• Jaime Davidovich’s Pioneering Television Art
• Taylor Swift fans sue Ticketmaster over Eras Tour ticketing mess

• NYT Connections hints and answers for May 18: Tips to solve 'Connections' #707.
• American Inferno by Margaret Eby
• Straight Talk by Ian Volner
• Delivering Chinese; Self
• The cicadas aren't invading the U.S.
• Audible sitewide sale: save up to 85% on all titles
• TPR vs. NYM: Bittersweet Victory by Cody Wiewandt
• TPR vs. NYM: Bittersweet Victory by Cody Wiewandt
• The Best Gaming Concept Art of 2016
• Wells Tower, DBC Pierre, and Tobias Wolff by Chris Flynn

• Best IPL deal: Save $80 on Braun IPL Silk·Expert
• New Art Museum in Hamburg Blown Up by Terry Southern
• Talking Dirty with Our Fall Issue by Sadie Stein
• James Salter: "This Is My Stockholm" by Thessaly La Force
• Watch how an old Venus spacecraft tumbled before crashing to Earth
• Age Gaps; Authorial Décor by Sadie Stein
• Stieg's Stockholm by Elisabeth Donnelly
• Staff Picks: Microstyle, The Epiplectic Bicycle by The Paris Review
• Waymo data shows humans are terrible drivers compared to AI
• James Salter Wins the 2010 Rea Award by The Paris Review