China’s Zhuque-3 makes historic first ground recovery of orbital-class booster

Historic Ground Landing

China successfully landed an orbital-class rocket booster on land for the first time on Wednesday morning, with the Zhuque-3 first stage touching down vertically in Gansu in a breakthrough for the country’s reusable rocket programme.

The Zhuque-3 Y2 reusable rocket lifted off at 07:35 Beijing time from the Dongfeng Commercial Space Innovation Pilot Zone in northwest China.

Around six minutes later, at 07:41, the first stage made a controlled vertical landing at the Zhuque-3 landing site in Minqin County, Gansu Province, roughly 390 kilometres southeast of the launch site.

Footage shows the booster descending towards the landing pad, deploying its landing legs and touching down vertically.

LandSpace Scores Breakthrough

The mission was carried out by Chinese commercial space company LandSpace on its second attempt to recover the Zhuque-3 booster. Its first attempt, in December 2025, reached orbit but failed during the final stage of landing.

The successful landing makes LandSpace the third private company, after SpaceX and Blue Origin, to land an orbital-class booster.

China had already recovered an orbital-class rocket at sea in July, using a net-capture system on a floating platform. Wednesday’s achievement marks the country’s first successful ground-based recovery using deployable landing legs.

China Eyes Cheaper, Reusable Launches

Both methods are part of China’s push to develop reusable rockets that can cut launch costs and support more frequent missions.

LandSpace plans to reuse a recovered first-stage booster within six months, as it works towards high-frequency, lower-cost commercial launches.

Article by Viory. Credit: CGTN