By KEILE CAMPBELL

Tribune Staff Reporter

kcampbell@tribunemedia.net

SPACEX hopes to resume Falcon 9 booster landings in Bahamian waters before the end of the year, with up to 20 additional recoveries planned at the Exuma Sound site once government approval is finalised.

The update came during the Ministry of Education’s Starlink rollout at CH Reeves Junior High School. SpaceX engineer Sarah Gillis told The Tribune the company is close to completing regulatory requirements for a second landing at the same deep-water site used for The Bahamas’ historic February 18 recovery.

“We are currently working through the regulatory process to ensure that the environmental review is complete and that we are meeting all the required monitoring and upkeep,” Ms Gillis said. “I think we are pretty close on that process towards a second landing in Exuma, and we are working with all the regulatory authorities to make sure it happens soon.”

She said the company hopes to complete another landing before the end of 2025. “I believe they are shooting for something before the end of this year,” she said. “We do not have too much left of the year, so it should be coming along soon.”

Ms Gillis said future landings would all use the Exuma Sound site and that SpaceX expects to perform “an additional 20 landings here in the Bahamas on the Exuma Sound landing site” once approved.

Environmental concerns surfaced after February’s landing, including questions about marine impacts and sonic booms. Ms Gillis said the current review includes extensive assessment.

“There is a very in-depth environmental assessment going on in terms of what the impacts might be to the environment,” she said. “We have done all sorts of modeling and predictions to make sure it is going to be safe, the site is far enough away from sensitive areas so that we are not endangering anything, and then there is also going to be a lot of before the launch, during the landing and then afterwards to make sure we are tracking the environmental impact, if there is anything. But all the predictions show that it should not be impactful. Aside from the instantaneous sound from the sonic boom coming in, it should be very, very low impact overall.”

She said discussions with Bahamian regulators have been positive.

Falcon 9 landings form part of SpaceX’s reusability programme, which reduces launch costs by allowing boosters to return to Earth and be flown multiple times.

An Environmental Impact Assessment released in September found the first landing produced “minimal” environmental effects, though it highlighted gaps in underwater noise measurements and recommended stronger monitoring and instrumentation for future missions.