Rocket Launch Today: Did it Actually Happen and Who Cares?

Okay, so Florida's Space Coast is apparently the Daytona 500 of rocket launches now. 101 launches this year? Color me unimpressed. We're supposed to be wowed by this? I mean, how many freakin' Starlink satellites do we need? Seriously.

Starlink Saturation: Is There Even a Limit?

SpaceX is chucking these things into orbit like they're goddamn confetti. I get it, internet for everyone, blah blah blah. But at what cost? Light pollution screwing with the astronomers? The ever-increasing risk of Kessler syndrome turning low Earth orbit into a debris-filled minefield? Nobody seems to care.

And don't even get me started on the "breaking records across the board" quote from Col. Brian Chatman. What a load of PR-speak. "Identifying efficiencies, getting additional mass to orbit"—it's like listening to a robot read a corporate press release. Give me a break. Efficiencies for who? Mass to orbit for what? More targeted ads beamed directly into our brains? Is that what we're celebrating?

The article says that the Space Force is planning on "between 100 to 120 rocket launches next year." And by 2035 to 2040? Upwards of 300 launches! Are they insane?

The "Good Old Days" of Space? Please.

Florida Tech's Robert Taylor, an emeritus space history professor, wistfully recalls the shuttle years, where 100 launches a year was just a dream. He says "Wernher Von Braun would be a happy man." Yeah, well, Von Braun was also a Nazi, so maybe let's not take his opinion as gospel, huh?

This whole thing is starting to feel like that scene in Wall-E where everyone's just floating around, passively consuming endless streams of garbage. Except instead of garbage, it's low-bandwidth cat videos beamed from space.

And offcourse, Cape Canaveral isn't the only one launching rockets. Vandenberg Space Force Base in California is also launching Starlink missions. It was the first flight of Falcon 9 first stage B1100, the eighth new booster to join the SpaceX fleet this year. Eight new boosters this year? How many boosters do they need? According to SpaceX launches 28 Starlink satellites from Vandenberg on brand new Falcon 9 rocket – Spaceflight Now, this launch included the first flight of Falcon 9 first stage B1100.

Plus, with Blue Origin and the New Glenn rocket eventually joining the party, this whole launch madness will only get worse.

But wait a minute... isn't there a whole Mars thing supposed to be happening? Where's the excitement about that? Are we so distracted by Elon's space internet that we've forgotten about, you know, actual space exploration?

Is This Progress, Or Just... More?

Honestly, I'm starting to think we're just addicted to "progress" for the sake of progress. We see a number go up—100 launches, 101 launches—and we automatically assume it's a good thing. But is it? Are we actually better off with 9,000+ Starlink satellites cluttering up the sky? Are we any closer to solving real problems, or are we just getting better at distracting ourselves from them?

Then again, maybe I'm just an old cynic yelling at clouds. Maybe this is the future, and I'm just too stuck in the past to see it. But something about this whole space race 2.0 feels... hollow.

It's Just a Matter of Time Before Something Goes Wrong