SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket lifted off from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station at 2:18 a.m. Eastern on 16 July, carrying 24 of Amazon’s Project Kuiper broadband satellites. The booster, flying its first mission, landed on the droneship “A Shortfall of Gravitas” minutes later, completing the first of three Kuiper launches SpaceX is under contract to perform for Amazon. The flight, designated KF-01, lifts the Kuiper constellation to 78 satellites following two earlier United Launch Alliance Atlas V missions. Amazon plans a 3,236-satellite network and must have about 1,600 craft in orbit by the end of July 2026 under its Federal Communications Commission licence. Delays to ULA’s Vulcan, Blue Origin’s New Glenn and Europe’s Ariane 6 prompted Amazon to tap its chief competitor for additional launch capacity. Amazon has earmarked more than $10 billion for Kuiper, analysts estimating total spending could reach $23 billion. The company is racing a market dominated by SpaceX’s Starlink, which already fields roughly 8,000 satellites and serves about 5 million customers worldwide. Wednesday’s launch underscores the unusual alliance between Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk as the two tech billionaires vie for leadership in low-Earth-orbit internet services.