On October 10, Chinese startup Orienspace launched its second Gravity-1 rocket. It successfully placed three satellites into orbit.
Orienspace was founded in 2020. Like many other Chinese aerospace startups, it decided to start its activities with the creation of solid-fuel rockets, and then move on to more powerful liquid launch vehicles. The company’s first rocket was Gravity-1.
Gravity-1 is 30 meters high and consists of four side boosters and three stages. All of them are solid fuel. It can carry up to 6.5 tons of cargo into low orbit and up to 4.2 tons into sun-synchronous orbit. This makes it the most powerful solid-fuel rocket in history. When activated, Gravity-1 engines produce large amounts of smoke and debris. Therefore, a barge is used to launch it.
The first flight of Gravity-1 took place in January 2024 and was successful. After that, Orienspace specialists modernized the rocket, which, according to the company, improved its reliability.
The second launch of Gravity-1 took place on October 10. Orienspace provided an official live broadcast of the mission, which is rare for Chinese launches. Gravity-1 successfully launched three spacecraft into near-polar orbit: an Earth remote sensing satellite and two satellites for the Internet of Things system being developed by Geely.
The successful launch of Gravity-1 is an important step toward realizing Orienspace’s ambitious plans. The company is actively working on a more powerful liquid rocket, Gravity-2, whose first test flight may take place before the end of this year. It will have a reusable first stage and will be capable of delivering over 20 tons of cargo into low Earth orbit.
Earlier, we reported on China’s plans to put rocket production on an assembly line.
According to Spacenews
