The feat came on the debut flight of the Long March 10B, which lifted off from the Hainan Commercial Space Launch Site on Friday at 12:15 a.m. EDT. CASC, the main contractor for China’s space program, described the mission as a historic breakthrough in reusable rocket technology that will lay a solid foundation for accelerating the improvement of the country’s space access capabilities.
The Long March 10B is a two-stage rocket standing about 207 feet, or 63 meters, tall. Its first stage burns kerosene and liquid oxygen, while the second stage uses liquid oxygen and liquid methane. In reusable mode, the vehicle can loft about 16 tons of payload to low Earth orbit.
The rocket flew with a payload on its debut, a satellite that CASC said reached its predetermined orbit. The company did not provide details about the spacecraft or its orbit. Approximately six minutes after stage separation, the first stage returned vertically and was recovered at a sea-based recovery platform using a net system. CASC officials described the launch and first-stage recovery as a complete success. The company said China plans to refly the first stage by the end of the year.
Until now, vertical landings of orbital-class rockets had been performed only by SpaceX, which has landed orbital rockets more than 600 times to date. That extensive reuse has allowed SpaceX to fly more cheaply and efficiently than its competitors and dominate the launch market, something China is working hard to emulate. CASC officials wrote that the Long March 10B’s reusable configuration significantly reduces launch costs, offering large payload capacity and high cost-effectiveness.
CASC framed the recovery as a milestone for China’s reusable rocket ambitions, calling it the country’s first successful controlled recovery of a launch vehicle. The company said the achievement signifies a historic breakthrough and supports faster development of national space access capabilities.
Other partially reusable Chinese rockets are also in development, including CASC’s Long March 12A and the Zhuque-3, built by the Beijing-based company Landspace. Both debuted this past December, reaching orbit as planned but failing to land their first stages. The companies CAS Space, Galactic Energy and Deep Blue Aerospace are developing their own reusable vehicles, the Kinetica-2, Pallas-1 and Nebula 1. China has announced plans to refly the recovered Long March 10B booster before the end of 2026.
