HELSINKI — Launch startup iSpace has successfully launched and landed a test article, a month after a first hop test, as Chinese reusable rocket efforts intensify.
ISpace’s Hyperbola-2Y methane-liquid oxygen reusable verification stage lifted off from a pad at Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in the Gobi Desert at 4:07 a.m. Eastern (1107 UTC) Dec. 10.
The Hyperbola-2Y reached an altitude of 343.12 meters, translating 50 meters to a landing zone and touching down with a velocity of 1.1 meters per second and an accuracy of 0.295 meters. The entire flight lasted 63.15 seconds, according to an iSpace press statement.
The flight came just over a month after a first hop test Nov. 2. That test reached 178 meters and returned to its landing spot. iSpace says it will attempt a test at sea next year after completing ground tests.
The company said the flight obtained further flight data of and provided a basis for the company’s ongoing development of the Hyperbola-3 reusable launch vehicle provides key technology verification.
The company is targeting a first flight of the 13.4-metric-ton to low Earth orbit (LEO) Hyperbola-3 rocket in 2025. A demonstration of recovering and reusing a first stage will follow in 2026. The 69-meter-long rocket will be able to lift 8.5 tons to LEO in reusable mode. iSpace says it aims to conduct 25 Hyperbola-3 launches per year by 2030.
The tests come years after Chinese commercial firms first announced plans to develop launchers with reusable first stages. Other companies, which began emerging after a Chinese policy shift in late 2014, are seemingly not far behind.
Fellow Beijing-based competitor Landspace is also gearing…
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