{"id":90057,"date":"2026-09-24T11:29:12","date_gmt":"2026-09-24T03:29:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp-productionenv-bjg9h2g2bgg5b8aa.southeastasia-01.azurewebsites.net\/?p=90057"},"modified":"2026-09-24T11:32:04","modified_gmt":"2026-09-24T03:32:04","slug":"china-launches-satellite-internet-leo-group-26-on-long-march-8a","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/news\/china-launches-satellite-internet-leo-group-26-on-long-march-8a\/","title":{"rendered":"China Launches Satellite Internet LEO Group 26 on Long March 8A (Video)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>China launched its 26th group of low-Earth-orbit satellite internet spacecraft aboard a Long March 8A rocket at 9:32 p.m. Beijing time on September 23, 2026. The rocket lifted off from the Hainan Commercial Space Launch Site and successfully placed the satellites into their designated orbit, continuing the country\u2019s accelerated deployment of space-based broadband infrastructure.<\/p>\n<div style=\"width: 100%;max-width: 989px;margin: 0 auto;aspect-ratio: 16 \/ 9\"><iframe style=\"width: 100%;height: 100%;border: 0\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/5sbmo-S8Yd0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><br \/>\n<\/iframe><\/div>\n<p>The satellites were developed under the leadership of the China Academy of Space Technology, part of China Aerospace Science and Technology Corp. Chinese authorities did not disclose the number of spacecraft carried, their individual masses, orbital parameters or expected operational roles. The \u201c26th group\u201d designation identifies the deployment batch rather than the number of satellites aboard the rocket.<\/p>\n<p>The mission came six days after a Long March 12 launched the 25th group of low-orbit satellite internet spacecraft from the same site on September 17. The short interval demonstrates how China is combining multiple medium-lift rockets with expanded launch infrastructure to increase constellation deployment rates.<\/p>\n<p>The Long March 8A was developed by the China Academy of Launch Vehicle Technology, another CASC subsidiary. It is a two-and-a-half-stage liquid-propellant rocket designed for low- and medium-Earth-orbit missions, particularly launches carrying multiple spacecraft for large constellations.<\/p>\n<p>The vehicle uses a 3.35-meter-diameter first-stage core burning liquid oxygen and kerosene, assisted by two liquid-propellant boosters. Its 3.35-meter-diameter upper stage uses liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen. A 5.2-meter payload fairing provides additional volume for larger satellites and multi-spacecraft deployment systems.<\/p>\n<p>The rocket is approximately 50.5 meters long, has a liftoff mass of about 371 metric tons and can carry around 7 metric tons to a 700-kilometer sun-synchronous orbit. That capability figure describes the rocket\u2019s general performance and does not confirm the orbit or payload mass of the latest mission.<\/p>\n<p>Compared with the original Long March 8, the Long March 8A combines a larger fairing with a higher-performance hydrogen-oxygen upper stage. The changes increase payload capacity and available volume while supporting the standardized processing required for frequent constellation launches.<\/p>\n<p>CASC described the September 23 mission as the second full-system verification flight following a comprehensive performance upgrade to the Long March 8A. The upgrade included flight-profile optimization and propulsion improvements intended to support heavier and higher-density satellite deployments.<\/p>\n<p>China has also expanded ground-processing capacity for the Long March 8 family. A second vertical integration and testing position entered service at the Hainan commercial launch complex in June 2026, allowing two rockets to undergo testing in parallel. CASC has said the dual-position arrangement could raise the family\u2019s annual processing capacity to as many as 30 missions.<\/p>\n<p>The six-day interval between the 25th and 26th satellite internet groups reflects the increasingly industrialized character of China\u2019s constellation program. Sustaining that pace will require coordinated satellite production, environmental testing, payload integration, launch processing and in-orbit commissioning.<\/p>\n<p>The mission was the 669th flight of the Long March rocket family. The Long March 8A is scheduled to conduct additional launches during 2026 as China continues deploying its low-Earth-orbit satellite internet infrastructure.<\/p>\n<p>The accelerating launch cadence also reflects the growing scale and maturity of China\u2019s commercial space supply chain. International customers planning constellations or individual satellite missions can <a href=\"https:\/\/starpath.global\/contact\">contact STARPATH GLOBAL<\/a> to evaluate competitively priced Chinese satellite platforms, payloads and AIT services against their technical requirements, schedules and budgets.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>China launched its 26th group of low-Earth-orbit satellite internet spacecraft aboard a Long March 8A rocket at 9:32 p.m. Beijing time on September 23, 2026. The rocket lifted off from the Hainan Commercial Space Launch Site and successfully placed the satellites into their designated orbit, continuing the country\u2019s accelerated deployment of space-based broadband infrastructure. The [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":90069,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[135,5727,291,10505,310,9970,5744,5922,4362],"class_list":["post-90057","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-china","tag-china-aerospace-science-and-technology-corporation","tag-commercial-space","tag-hainan-commercial-space-launch-site","tag-launch-vehicles","tag-long-march-8a","tag-low-earth-orbit","tag-satellite-constellations","tag-satellite-internet"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90057"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=90057"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90057\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":90075,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/90057\/revisions\/90075"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/90069"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=90057"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=90057"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=90057"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}