Sea recovery trial of China’s Yuanxingzhe-1 test rocket on May 29th in Haiyang City, Shandong Province.
The 57-tonne rocket, nicknamed “chubby,” landed safely after a 125-second flight.
It reached an altitude of 2.5 kilometers.
The test covered eight stages, including ignition and liftoff, full-thrust ascent, thrust adjustment, first engine shutdown, free fall glide, engine re-ignition, deceleration hover, and soft landing on the sea.
Another one. China successfully launched the Lijian-1 Y7 carrier rocket with six satellites onboard on Wednesday, May 21, 2025.
The launch took place from a commercial aerospace innovation pilot zone in northwest China, and the satellites were successfully sent into their planned orbits. This mission marks the seventh flight of the Lijian-1 carrier rocket series.
The six satellites launched were: Taijing-3 04, Taijing-4 02A, Xingrui-11, Xingjiyuan-1, Lifang108 001, and Xiguang-1 02.
Another one on the same day. On Monday, May 19, 2025, a CERES-1S Y5 commercial carrier rocket, developed by the private firm Galactic Energy, lifted off from a sea platform near Shandong Province, China.
The rocket successfully sent four Tianqi satellites (Tianqi 34 to 37) into a low Earth orbit. These satellites are part of the Tianqi Constellation, which is being built and operated by Guodian Gaoke. The Tianqi constellation is a series of experimental Low Earth Orbit (LEO) communication satellites primarily for Internet-of-Things (IoT) communications. They are designed to provide data collection and transmission services for terrestrial network coverage blind spots, with applications in various industries such as marine, environmental protection, meteorology, forestry, emergency response, and smart cities. Some of these satellites also carry cameras for educational purposes.
This launch is significant as it marks the completion of the first phase of the Tianqi constellation, establishing China’s first low Earth orbit IoT constellation. It also highlights the growing capabilities of China’s private aerospace companies in conducting commercial sea launches.
May 19, 2025. A maritime rocket launched successfully from the Yellow Sea waters off Rizhao, Shandong province, China. This area is becoming an established site for China’s sea-based rocket launches. The rocket used for this mission was a Long March CZ-11 solid-propellant carrier rocket. This type of rocket is often used for rapid deployment of satellites from mobile sea platforms. The primary payload for this mission was a new Earth observation satellite named “Qingdao-6” (青岛六号). This satellite is expected to be used for various applications, including urban planning, environmental monitoring, and disaster management. Chinese state media has officially declared the launch a complete success, with the satellite successfully entering its intended orbit.
China launched 12 satellites on May 14, 2025, as the initial phase of building what they are calling the world’s first space-based AI supercomputer.
This ambitious project is known as the “Three-Body Computing Constellation” and is part of a broader “Star Compute” initiative. The goal is to deploy a total of 2,800 satellites that will function as an orbital data processing network.
Key aspects of this development include:
Onboard Processing: Unlike traditional satellites that primarily collect data and send it back to Earth for processing, these new satellites are designed to process and analyze data directly in orbit using advanced AI-powered computing systems. This significantly reduces reliance on ground stations and overcomes bandwidth limitations that prevent over 90% of raw satellite data from reaching Earth.
High Performance: Each of the initial 12 satellites is equipped with an 8-billion parameter AI model and can perform 744 trillion operations per second (TOPS). Collectively, this first cluster delivers 5 peta operations per second (POPS). The ultimate goal for the full constellation is to achieve 1,000 POPS, which would be far more powerful than many Earth-bound supercomputers.
Interconnectivity: The satellites are interconnected using ultra-fast laser communication links, capable of transferring data at up to 100 gigabits per second, and share 30 terabytes of onboard storage.
Developers: The project is led by Chinese companies like ADA Space in collaboration with Zhejiang Lab and Neijang High-Tech Zone.
Benefits and Applications:
Reduced latency and increased efficiency: By processing data in space, it eliminates delays and bottlenecks associated with transmitting data back to Earth.
Environmental advantages: Space-based data centers can utilize solar power and naturally dissipate heat into space, reducing energy consumption and the carbon footprint compared to large terrestrial data centers.
Diverse applications: The system is envisioned for real-time applications in disaster monitoring, urban planning, virtual tourism, real-time interactive media, and scientific research (e.g., using X-ray polarization detectors to study cosmic events).
Strategic implications: This development is seen as a significant step in China’s push for AI dominance and technological leadership in space, potentially influencing future global computing infrastructure and geopolitical competition.
China launched Long March-2D carrier rocket early on Thu morning and successfully transported Yaogan 36 remote-sensing satellite to orbit. This is the 15th launch mission Long March-2D has completed in 2022, setting a record of annual launch time for its type.
