SpaceX Dominating World Launch Market, NSS' Skran Says

With SpaceX accounting for 77% of U.S. launches in 2022, and doing more than all Chinese launches combined, "this is what domination of the world launch market looks like," National Space Society Policy Committee Chairman Dale Skran blogged Monday. He said SpaceX benefited from world customers not using Russian rockets due to the Ukraine war, but even without that boost SpaceX "would still be strongly leading." SpaceX did 61 Falcon 9 flights and one Falcon Heavy launch in 2022, vs. 31 launches in 2021, he said. Of 2022's launches, 34 were for its Starlink broadband constellation and another 13 had commercial payloads, he said. He said since SpaceX plans to mass-launch its second-generation Starlinks using its Starship super heavy-lift launch rocket, "things may look different."