HELSINKI — China conducted the first launch of the Long March 8A early Tuesday, carrying a second batch of satellites into orbit for the national Guowang project.
The first Long March 8A lifted off at 4:30 a.m. Eastern (0930 UTC) Feb. 11 from Wenchang Satellite Launch Center. The China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation (CASC) declared the launch successful more than an hour after liftoff, revealing the payloads to be low Earth orbit (LEO) satellite internet satellites (02 group). The spacecraft are understood to be part of the national Guowang (SatNet) broadband megaconstellation.
CASC did not initially reveal how many satellites were aboard the launch. The first Guowang group launch, on the much more powerful Long March 5B, carried 10 satellites. Tracking from the U.S. Space Force space domain awareness will later reveal how many objects associated with the launch have entered orbit.
Notably, details such as size, mass and capabilities, as well as images of the satellites have yet to be revealed after either launch. This has raised questions over the nature of the spacecraft and transparency over China’s plans for the nominally-civilian Guowang project.
CASC’s China Academy of Space Technology (CAST) produced the satellites for Tuesday’s launch. The state-owned China Satellite Network Group Co., Ltd. (China SatNet) oversees the Guowang/SatNet project, which envisions a constellation of around 13,000 satellites in low Earth orbit.
Long March 8A
The Long March 8A is an upgraded variant of the standard Long March 8, which debuted in December 2020. It features the same first stage and side boosters as the original but includes a newly designed 3.35-meter-diameter hydrogen-oxygen second stage, allowing a wider, 5.2-meter-diameter payload fairing.
It has a length of 50.5 meters, mass at liftoff of 371,000 kilograms and produces a liftoff thrust of around 480 tons.
The rocket can carry around 7,000 kilograms to 700-km Sun-synchronous orbit (SSO). Together with the standard Long March 8, the series offers payload capacities of 5,000 and 7,000 kg to SSO, according to CASC, improving China’s ability to launch constellations of satellites.
The Long March 8 was initially planned as a possible first test of reusability, keeping the side boosters attached for ballast to adjust for limited variable thrust capabilities of engines to allow a propulsive landing. That plan, however, has long since been dropped, with CASC pursuing reusable launchers through the Long March 9, 10 and 12 rockets. A reusable version of the latter could debut as soon as this year, though an inconclusive vertical liftoff and powered splashdown test in January may affect the timeline.
The expendable Long March 8 series is, however, expected to be prepared for high cadence launch activity, with a modularized construction, ramped up production of the YF-100 engines for its core and booster stages, and a dedicated launch pad at the Hainan commercial spaceport. The rockets could play a large role in launching one or both of China’s Guowang and Thousand Sails/Qianfan megaconstellations.
Tuesday’s mission was China’s seventh orbital launch attempt of 2025 and the first since the Lunar New Year. The previous launches saw the fourth batch of Qianfan satellites launch on a Long March 6A from Taiyuan and a Long March 3B launch from Xichang sending the TJS-14 test satellite towards the geostationary belt.
CASC has yet to publish an overview of China’s plans for the year, which is expected later this month. The country may once again attempt to reach around 100 launches, as targeted for 2024.
Major missions for 2025 include crewed Shenzhou-20 and -21 missions and Tianzhou cargo spacecraft to the Tiangong space station and the Tianwen-2 near-Earth asteroid sample return mission. The latter is expected to launch around May.
China also aims to debut a number of new Long March and potentially reusable commercial rockets during 2025. These could include first “low-cost” cargo missions to the Tiangong space station.
