The Mayor of Long Beach, Robert Garcia, announced a new SpaceX location in California. The aerospace company’s headquarters is located in Los Angeles suburb of Hawthorne at a large three-story facility where rockets are built and mission control operations take place. “We are excited to announce and welcome SpaceX to Long Beach. SpaceX is moving into 6.5 acres at the Port of Long Beach,” Long Beach Mayor Garcia stated via Twitter, “We have a booming and growing space and technology economy which is now the largest of any city on the West Coast,” he said.

We are excited to announce and welcome @SpaceX to Long Beach. SpaceX is moving into 6.5 acres at the Port of Long Beach. We have a booming and growing space and technology economy which is now the largest of any city on the West Coast.

— Robert Garcia (@RobertGarcia) April 26, 2021

The Long Beach Board of Harbor Commissioners approved the new location lease agreement with the launch company on Monday, April 26. According to Long Beach Post News, SpaceX will occupy a facility at Pier T beginning May 1, and will pay $107,000 per month under a lease term of 2 years. The facility was previously leased by Sea Launch, a commercial satellite launching company that had been at the port for 20 years. Prior to Sea Launch, the site was used by the U.S. Navy. 

SpaceX does not plan to launch rockets from the new location, instead, the Port of Long Beach will be used for West Coast rocket recovery operations. The location includes a 61,700-square-foot warehouse building and 62,000 square feet of paved land. SpaceX will use a wharf along the beach to dock its autonomous droneship platforms at sea, where Falcon 9 rocket’s first-stage lands soon after launching payload to space. Recovering rocket boosters to reuse decreases the cost of spaceflight. SpaceX is currently the only company in the world capable of recovering orbital class rockets routinely with the help of the landing ocean platforms. To date, the company has recovered 80 orbital-class rockets.

Image Source: SpaceX

Featured Image Source: U.S. Space Force