A pair of missions to space stations headline the launches for the week of Jan. 10 to Jan. 17. Axiom-3 will be flying four private astronauts to the International Space Station (ISS), becoming the first crew launch of 2024. Crew Dragon Freedom will fly from Florida, with a multinational crew, for a mission to the Station lasting around two weeks.
The Tianzhou 7 cargo spacecraft headed for the Chinese Space Station Tiangong has flown this week, and Japan has launched a military reconnaissance satellite aboard one of its last H-IIA rockets. In addition, the Gravity-1 rocket developed by the Chinese firm OrienSpace made its maiden flight. Starlink 7-10 and Starlink 6-37 have now launched successfully, while a Kuaizhou-1A launched successfully from Jiuquan on Jan. 11.
The Tianzhou-7 flight launched on Wednesday, Jan. 17, while Axiom-3 launched on Thursday, Jan. 18. Starlink 7-11 has now been delayed with the next attempt to be determined. These launches would continue what is a rapid cadence of flights so far this year. 2023 featured 220 orbital launch attempts which is a new record, but 2024 is likely to eclipse this.