Overview
- A Long March 12 lifted off from Hainan to deliver the 13th batch of Guowang satellites, marking the rocket’s third flight, with officials not disclosing how many spacecraft were on board.
- Guowang is planned to reach nearly 13,000 satellites with an interim goal of about 400 in orbit by 2027, and recent launches have pushed the current tally to more than 100.
- Hours after the Guowang mission, Galactic Energy’s Ceres-1 launched from Jiuquan and failed when its fourth stage shut down prematurely roughly 510 seconds after ignition, leaving its payload short of orbit.
- Galactic Energy apologized to customers and opened a failure investigation, while media reports differed on the identities and number of satellites aboard the failed mission.
- The two missions were China’s 71st and 72nd orbital launch attempts of 2025, with the Ceres-1 loss marking the nation’s second failure this year as a record launch cadence continues, and it remains unclear whether the setback will affect the planned Ceres-2 debut.