Private Chinese rocket reaches orbit 2 years after test-flight failure (video)

ByAndrew Jonespublished7 December 2022

The privately developed rocket suffered setbacks before finally reaching space.

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A private Chinese solid rocket has conducted its first successful launch, two years after failing its first test flight.

The launcher is operated by Expace, a commercial spinoff from the China Aerospace Science and Industry Corporation (CASIC), a state-owned defense giant.

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The first Kuaizhou 11 launch took place in July 2020 butended in failure. Expace also suffered anexplosion during testing at the Jiuquan spaceport, which may have been a factor in the two-year grounding of the rocket.

The mission was China's 57th launch of 2022, most of which have been performed by China's main space contractor CASC, including a number ofmissions to the country's Tiangong space station.

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Andrew Jones

Contributing Writer

Andrew is a freelance space journalist with a focus on reporting on China's rapidly growing space sector. He began writing for Space.com in 2019 and writes for SpaceNews, IEEE Spectrum, National Geographic, Sky & Telescope, New Scientist and others. Andrew first caught the space bug when, as a youngster, he saw Voyager images of other worlds in our solar system for the first time. Away from space, Andrew enjoys trail running in the forests of Finland. You can follow him on Twitter @AJ_FI.