China lands reusable rocket breakthrough
China lands reusable rocket breakthrough <br> China’s commercial space industry took another important step towards making rocket launches cheaper, more frequent and more commercially viable after the successful recovery of the first stage of a Zhuque-3 reusable rocket on land. The Zhuque-3 Y2, developed by Beijing-based private aerospace company LandSpace, lifted off from the Dongfeng Commercial Space Innovation Pilot Zone in northwest China on Wednesday morning. It successfully deployed the Honghu-03 satellite into its designated orbit before its first stage returned to Earth and made a controlled landing at a designated recovery site in Gansu province. The landing, completed less than 10 minutes after liftoff, marked China’s first successful land-based controlled recovery of an orbital-class launch vehicle’s first stage using deployable landing legs. The achievement represents a major advance in the country’s effort to move reusab...