China launches two satellites for “new technology verification for space target detection”
China today successfully launched two technology test satellites designed to do “space target detection”, its Long March 7A rocket lifting off from its coastal Wenchang spaceport.
China’s state-run press provided no other information. It also appears the drop zones for the rocket’s lower stages were once again in Philippino waters, requiring that government to warn its citizens to avoid those zones and subsequent any rocket debris.
The leaders in the 2025 launch race:
168 SpaceX
90 China (a new record)
18 Rocket Lab
17 Russia
SpaceX still leads the rest of the world in successful launches, 168 to 150.
At this moment no other launches are scheduled before the end of the year, thus closing out the 2025 year in rocketry. I will publish my annual global report in the next few days. Stay tuned.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The print edition can be purchased at Amazon or from any other book seller. If you want an autographed copy the price is $60 for the hardback and $45 for the paperback, plus $8 shipping for each. Go here for purchasing details. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News
China today successfully launched two technology test satellites designed to do “space target detection”, its Long March 7A rocket lifting off from its coastal Wenchang spaceport.
China’s state-run press provided no other information. It also appears the drop zones for the rocket’s lower stages were once again in Philippino waters, requiring that government to warn its citizens to avoid those zones and subsequent any rocket debris.
The leaders in the 2025 launch race:
168 SpaceX
90 China (a new record)
18 Rocket Lab
17 Russia
SpaceX still leads the rest of the world in successful launches, 168 to 150.
At this moment no other launches are scheduled before the end of the year, thus closing out the 2025 year in rocketry. I will publish my annual global report in the next few days. Stay tuned.
On Christmas Eve 1968 three Americans became the first humans to visit another world. What they did to celebrate was unexpected and profound, and will be remembered throughout all human history. Genesis: the Story of Apollo 8, Robert Zimmerman's classic history of humanity's first journey to another world, tells that story, and it is now available as both an ebook and an audiobook, both with a foreword by Valerie Anders and a new introduction by Robert Zimmerman.
The print edition can be purchased at Amazon or from any other book seller. If you want an autographed copy the price is $60 for the hardback and $45 for the paperback, plus $8 shipping for each. Go here for purchasing details. The ebook is available everywhere for $5.99 (before discount) at amazon, or direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit. If you buy it from ebookit you don't support the big tech companies and the author gets a bigger cut much sooner.
The audiobook is also available at all these vendors, and is also free with a 30-day trial membership to Audible.
"Not simply about one mission, [Genesis] is also the history of America's quest for the moon... Zimmerman has done a masterful job of tying disparate events together into a solid account of one of America's greatest human triumphs."--San Antonio Express-News


A new monthly record for successful orbital launches was set in December with 38!
Beat the old record set in Sep & Nov of 30.
WooHoo!
I have to say, 90 launches is an impressive total for the Chinese.
And it ought to shame certain other space powers how far behind the Chinese they are now.
Japan, like the Euros, are all about pomp and circumstance.
But they do produce good stationary.
At some point…kids will watch anime in orbit…and that will be as close as Japan ever gets to human spaceflight.
Their last Yamato was that MHD deal that looked sleeker than the Deep Space Nine runabout.
It was on display until the mid Twenty-teens….then scrapped.
They could have used it as a movie set, for crying out loud.
Richard M,
If the Russians were capable of shame, you’d be right. As things stand, I’d be delighted if, on Jan. 1, 2027, the Russian launch total for 2026 makes them look back nostalgically on 2025 as being “the good old days.”