SPACE VIEW PARK, TITUSVILLE, FL – Under ultra clear late evening skies a huge crowd of spectators enjoyed a stunning nighttime Saturday blastoff and landing as a SpaceX Falcon 9 1^st stage booster launch to space and back on its record setting 33^rd mission – from Florida’s Space Coast on Feb. 21

We observed the beautiful launch and landing of a SpaceX Starlink first stage booster on its fleet leading 33^rd space spectacle as it flew on a south-easterly trajectory.

We were watching from Space View Park in Titusville, FL, along the  Indian River Lagoon with NASA’s Artemis II moon rocket easily and clearly in view – blazing with Xenon floodlights

Enjoy our photos from the Space UpClose team of Ken Kremer and Jean Wright – including our long duration streak shots above and below

On Saturday, February 21 at 10:47 p.m. ET, Falcon 9 launched another 28 Starlink satellites to low-Earth orbit from Space Launch Complex 40 (SLC-40) at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida.

Starlink LEO broadband internet constellation now comprises over 9,700 satellites.

The booster descent and landing was faintly visible to the naked eye from our vantage point at Space View Park as it touched down several hundreds of miles away and far behind but seemingly beside the SpaceX Starship Gigifactory – rapidly rising under construction on the grounds of NASA’s vast Kennedy Space Center property

The rapid fire cadence of SpaceX launches from last years record setting pace in 2025 is continuing into the first months of 2026 and is expected to continue all year long.

This was the 33rd flight for the first stage booster F9 B1067.33 supporting this mission, which previously launched CRS-22, Crew-3, Turksat 5B, Crew-4, CRS-25, Eutelsat HOTBIRD 13G, SES O3B mPOWER-A, PSN SATRIA, Telkomsat Merah Putih 2, Galileo L13, Koreasat-6A, and now 21 Starlink missions.

Following stage separation, the first stage landed on the A Shortfall of Gravitas (ASOG) droneship, which was stationed in the Atlantic Ocean and which we observed .

SpaceX is working to certify its 1^st stage boosters for up to 40 flights each.