More rocket launches could light up the San Diego sky as SpaceX builds out satellite network

Rocket-building skills also transfer over into other areas such as underwater exploration and defense industries, Christensen said.

The launches may even boost local tourism, he said. People will drive many miles to see the launches, and they can see them anywhere along the Southern California coast.

"It's another thing to see in San Diego," he said.

The proposed SpaceX expansion at Vandenberg includes the additional landings of the rocket's reusable first stage. The second stage, which is not reusable, delivers the payload into orbit and then eventually falls back to earth and burns up in the atmosphere.

Some of the landings would be on a drone ship somewhere in the ocean at least 31 miles from the coast and as far out as several hundred miles, anywhere between the latitudes of Los Angeles and the middle of Baja California. Some of the first stages also land on a platform at Vandenberg.

SpaceX moved one of its drone ships, essentially a modified barge, from Port Canaveral in Florida to the Port of Long Beach in California in 2021. The platform is towed to and from a location near the landing, but once there it can remotely adjust its position.

Named the "Of Course I Still Love You," the drone ship was used as recently as January for a successful landing off the coast of Baja California. The trip to earth orbit is quick, and, in that case, the landing occurred just 8.5 minutes after the takeoff.

Coastal Commission staffers determined the expansion qualifies for a "negative declaration," which means they expect no significant environmental impacts from the launches.

"The project has the potential to result in a variety of effects on California coastal resources, including the release of debris into the ocean and disturbance to sensitive species due to elevated sound levels," the commission's report states.

"The proposed launches would serve the primary purpose of placing into Earth orbit thousands of small satellites for SpaceX's 'Starlink' commercial satellite internet business," the report states. Each rocket can carry as many as 22 satellites.

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