By David Dickinson
June 3, 2025
Personal firm Area Epoch passes a vital take a look at, forward of aiming for orbit later this yr.
Chinese language rocket startup Area Epoch placed on a present not too long ago, with a demonstration test launch of their reusable Yanxinghe-1 rocket booster.
The take a look at launch occurred on the Oriental Spaceport industrial launch website in Shandong province, and lasted 125 seconds. The Yanxingzhe-1 rocket reached an apogee of two.5 kilometers shortly after launch, descended, re-lit its engines and carried out an ocean soft-landing shortly after. Although the booster slowly sank into the ocean after landing, the launch and take a look at was successful.
The take a look at was essential to display full thrust, variable thrust adjustment, shutdown and restart of the engine. Free-descent, glide and hover forward of touchdown was additionally carried out.
The rocket is an modern design, that includes a lightweight, thin-walled aluminum stainless-steel liquid oxygen and methane-fueled booster. The Yanxinghe booster used within the take a look at is 4.2 meters in diameter and 26.8 meters tall. In distinction, SpaceX’s Falcon-9 first stage booster utilized in restoration landings is 3.7 meters vast, and 41 meters tall. The booster was constructed by the Jianyuan Know-how cooperation.
The booster launch. Credit score: Area Epoch.
“The success of this flight restoration take a look at is a serious breakthrough within the improvement of liquid reusable rockets and has milestone significance.” says Sepoch and Jianyuan Know-how on WeChat. “It additionally marks that large-scale stainless-steel reusable launch automobiles have entered the engineering utility stage, laying a stable basis for this yr’s first flight of Yuanxinghe No. 1.”
Area Epoch (typically abbreviated Sepoch) is a Bejieng-based area startup. A flurry of China-based startups have emerged lately, to incorporate Landspace, iSpace and Galactic Power. Landspace reached orbit on July 2023, and landed a booster with the take a look at of the Zhuque-3 rocket on January 19th, 2024.
China versus SpaceX
The thought of touchdown and reusing boosters was pioneered by SpaceX, with the profitable first touchdown of a Falcon-9 stage one booster on December 21st. 2015. It is unusual to suppose; SpaceX has turned this feat right into a close to every day routine incidence, with a U.S. launch practically each different day in 2025. Most of these have been Starlink batch launches, with 49 to date for 2025.
Methalox engine testing in 2021. Credit score: Jiuzhou Yunjian.
Watching the spaceflight schedule worldwide, launches are actually primarily divided into three classes: China, SpaceX, and all others.
China’s Shanghai Spacecom Satellite tv for pc Know-how’s (SSST) is even at present fielding its personal reply to SpaceX’s Starlink, with the corporate’s 1,000 Sails mega-satellite constellation initiative began in late 2024.
A chrome steel booster tank below building. Credit score: Area Epoch.
Area Epoch is trying to obtain orbit with their Yuanxinghe rocket later this yr. This comes as China accomplished the launch of its first asteroid pattern retrieval mission final week, and continues a long run human presence in orbit with their Tiangong Area Station. The company additionally plans to launch its personal model of Hubble the Xuntian area telescope in 2026 to station-keep with Tiangong. It’s additionally not out of the realm of chance that China may full the primary Mars Pattern Return mission, with the launch of Tianwen-3 in 2028.
It is a busy yr in spaceflight, and will probably be attention-grabbing to see Area Epoch and different China-based startups take to orbit quickly.
