18 August 2026 year Fr. 23:00 (UTC) From Juzuan Cosmond, China, the "Honghu" spacecraft was launched with the help of the "Zhuque-3" reusable launch vehicle-03».
«Honghu-03» – a Chinese low-orbit communications satellite, which is the first vehicle of the planned Honghu-3 group, intended for the provision of broadband satellite communication and Internet access services. It is planned to be deployed 10 000 satellites "Honghu-3" in 160 orbital planes, close 5 000 Spacecraft must be deployed to the end 2030 year.
This launch is the second test launch of the Zhuque-3 reusable rocket, developed by the Chinese private company LandSpace.
The main task of the mission is to check the operation of the Zhuque-3 two-stage rocket on liquid oxygen and methane, launching the payload into low Earth orbit and re-attempting the vertical landing of the first stage at a special site in the Mintsin area, Gansu province, about for 390 km from the starting area.
Previous flight 3 December 2025 year ended with the successful launch of the second stage into orbit, however, the first stage was lost during the final landing stage due to a combustion anomaly.
According to the CCS