Zhuque-3 Recovery: People Behind China’s Rocket Milestone
On the morning of August 19, 2026, a 66-meter stainless-steel rocket lifted off from the Dongfeng Commercial Space Innovation Pilot Zone in northwest China’s Gansu Province. Approximately 137 seconds later, its first stage separated and began a precisely choreographed descent — adjusting its attitude at high altitude, firing engines for re-entry deceleration, gliding aerodynamically, and deploying landing legs before touching down smoothly at a designated recovery site in Minqin County. The mission was a complete success: China had achieved its first land-based controlled recovery of a rocket’s first stage using deployable landing legs, according to Xinhua.
The achievement marked a pivotal moment in China’s commercial space program, placing the private company LandSpace in an elite global club alongside SpaceX, Blue Origin, and China’s state space agency as the fourth entity to successfully recover an orbital launch vehicle. It was also the world’s first stainless-steel booster recovery following an orbital launch, as Interesting Engineering noted.
A Decade of Perseverance
Behind the technical triumph lies a deeply human story — one of childhood dreams, painful failures, and the relentless pursuit of what aerospace engineers call “guiling” (归零), the discipline of returning to zero after failure to systematically identify and fix problems.
At the center of that story is Dai Zheng, the 42-year-old chief commander of the Zhuque-3 rocket. In a feature published by Xinhua, Dai’s journey unfolds from a fourth-grade summer camp in Fujian Province, where he built a paper rocket that flew 70 meters high, to his studies at Tsinghua University’s School of Aerospace Engineering, and his work on China’s Long March-3 and Long March-5 programs at the China Academy of Launch Vehicle Technology.
The path was never straightforward. In 2015, after SpaceX’s Falcon 9 achieved its first booster recovery, Dai made the risky decision to leave his state job and join LandSpace, a startup founded that year by Zhang Changwu after China’s 2014 policy change opened the space industry to private capital. “It feels like being reborn and shedding another layer of skin,” Dai recalled. “But for many things, someone always needs to take the first step.”
From Failure to Success
The road to August 19 was paved with setbacks. LandSpace’s first rocket, Zhuque-1, failed to reach orbit in October 2018. The Zhuque-2 Y1 failed in December 2022 before the Y2 became the world’s first methane-fueled rocket to reach orbit in July 2023, as documented in LandSpace’s Wikipedia entry.
Most recently, the Zhuque-3 Y1’s maiden flight on December 3, 2025, reached orbit but failed to recover its first stage. Dai Zheng later disclosed that the landing ignition experienced abnormal combustion at 3.3 kilometers altitude, causing the booster to crash at the edge of the landing pad, as IT之家 reported.
“Maybe painful, maybe disappointing,” Dai said of the possibility of another failure. “But from failure, we can definitely gain valuable trial-and-error experience, making the next time better than the last.”
Technical Innovation and Economic Ambition
The Zhuque-3’s design reflects LandSpace’s ambition to compete on cost and capability. The rocket uses a stainless-steel main structure — a departure from the aluminum-lithium alloy used in most rockets — and is powered by nine TQ-12A liquid oxygen-methane engines with thrust adjustable from 40% to 110% of rated power. The methane propellant provides cleaner burns than kerosene, reducing engine soot and streamlining refurbishment for quicker reuse.
The economics are compelling: the first stage represents approximately 70% of total rocket cost, while liquid oxygen-methane propellant accounts for only 1-3% of launch cost. LandSpace’s goal is to reduce launch costs to below 20,000 RMB per kilogram, which would be transformative for China’s space economy.
A Satellite Built for Scale
The Zhuque-3 Y2 carried the Honghu-03 satellite into orbit — the first satellite manufactured in Xiong’an New Area, developed by Hongqing Technology. The satellite carries multiple Chinese firsts, including an argon propellant electric propulsion system, active thermal control with deployable radiator, and the first Tbps-class onboard router, according to IT之家’s coverage. “From its core components to the complete system, the satellite has been developed via the technical path suitable for batch production ever since its design phase,” said Wan Jun, chairman of Beijing LandSpace Hong Qing Technology.
Candid Assessment of the Road Ahead
Despite the milestone, LandSpace’s engineers remain measured about the journey ahead. Deputy Chief Designer Dong Kai offered a candid comparison to SpaceX’s Falcon 9, using cultivation novel terminology: if Falcon 9 is at the “Huashen” (Spirit Transformation) level, Zhuque-3 is only at the “Jiedan” (Core Formation) stage. Once it can be reused, it will reach the “Yuanying” (Nascent Soul) stage, as IT之家 reported. His immediate goal is for Zhuque-3 to cross the threshold of 10 launches per year.
LandSpace plans to conduct a re-flight test of the recovered booster within six months, establishing a closed loop of launch, recovery, inspection, and reuse, according to IT之家. The company aims to eventually scale up to 30-50 launches per year, with new TQ-12B engines expected in late 2026 to early 2027.
What’s Next
The successful recovery is critical for China’s satellite internet ambitions. With the Guowang and Qianfan constellations requiring tens of thousands of satellites to compete with Starlink, reusable rockets are essential for economically deploying large-scale constellations. China’s networks have stalled at roughly 200 satellites compared to SpaceX’s 10,000+ operational satellites, as Interesting Engineering noted.
For Dai Zheng, the mission transcends economics and geopolitics. “Humanity will not be ‘locked’ in a limited space like Earth,” he said. “We will eventually break through the ceiling of development to explore the universe.”
Reflecting on the moment of launch, he added: “Through a lot of tedious and rigorous calculations, experiments, and improvements, what we now obtain is an ultimate form of delayed gratification. When the rocket lifts off, the vibration of the earth and the sound of the rocket body crossing the atmosphere come one after another, I feel that humanity is truly great, and each of us is part of it.”
As the recovered booster awaits its next flight, the engineers who chase stars and forge arrows are already looking toward the next launch — and the next “arrow” to pierce the sky.