Chinese solid-fueled rocket fails during launch
The commercial division of a Chinese space agency, dubbed CAS Space, late yesterday experienced a launch failure of its solid-fueled Kinetica-1 rocket, lifting off from the Jiuquan spaceport in northwest China.
A statement by the pseudo-company described the failure tersely:
We can confirm that the first two stages were nominal. Stage 3 lost attitude three seconds after ignition and the self-destructing mechanism was activated.
Nothing was said about where the first two stages crashed inside China, or whether they landed near habitable areas.
According to the first link above, this was the second launch failure by China in 2024, which is incorrect. This was the third launch failure for China (see here and here for previous two). That article also says this was the 68th total launch this year, suggesting China has completed 66 successful launches. This does not jive with my count, which presently says China has had 64 successful orbital launches this year. I suspect the two additional launched might have been suborbital tests — such as first stage hop tests (here, here, and here) — which I do not include in these totals. It also might be including the accidental launch of one first stage during a static fire test when it broke free and launched itself unintentional.
More recent information from my readers (see the comments below) suggests that, though the numbers above are not correct, my own count for China’s total successful orbital launches needs adjusting as well. I had marked a March 13th Chinese launch as a failure because the satellites were not placed in their proper orbit. However, using their thrusters engineers were eventually able to get them into place and they are operating. I have therefore increased China’s totals below by one.
The leaders in the 2024 launch race:
134 SpaceX
65 China
17 Russia
14 Rocket Lab
American private enterprise still leads the rest of the world combined in successful launches 154 to 97, while SpaceX by itself leads the entire world, including American companies, 134 to 117.
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The commercial division of a Chinese space agency, dubbed CAS Space, late yesterday experienced a launch failure of its solid-fueled Kinetica-1 rocket, lifting off from the Jiuquan spaceport in northwest China.
A statement by the pseudo-company described the failure tersely:
We can confirm that the first two stages were nominal. Stage 3 lost attitude three seconds after ignition and the self-destructing mechanism was activated.
Nothing was said about where the first two stages crashed inside China, or whether they landed near habitable areas.
According to the first link above, this was the second launch failure by China in 2024, which is incorrect. This was the third launch failure for China (see here and here for previous two). That article also says this was the 68th total launch this year, suggesting China has completed 66 successful launches. This does not jive with my count, which presently says China has had 64 successful orbital launches this year. I suspect the two additional launched might have been suborbital tests — such as first stage hop tests (here, here, and here) — which I do not include in these totals. It also might be including the accidental launch of one first stage during a static fire test when it broke free and launched itself unintentional.
More recent information from my readers (see the comments below) suggests that, though the numbers above are not correct, my own count for China’s total successful orbital launches needs adjusting as well. I had marked a March 13th Chinese launch as a failure because the satellites were not placed in their proper orbit. However, using their thrusters engineers were eventually able to get them into place and they are operating. I have therefore increased China’s totals below by one.
The leaders in the 2024 launch race:
134 SpaceX
65 China
17 Russia
14 Rocket Lab
American private enterprise still leads the rest of the world combined in successful launches 154 to 97, while SpaceX by itself leads the entire world, including American companies, 134 to 117.
Readers!
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black. Your support allows me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Only now does it appear that Washington might finally recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are four ways of doing so:
1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.
2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation.
3. A Paypal Donation or subscription:
4. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
P.O.Box 1262
Cortaro, AZ 85652
You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above.
I believe SpaceX still has three more launches planned this year. Pretty darned impressive.
Re: Chinese launch total discrepancies.
I was looking through the launch pages on Wiki and Gunter’s site…
Wiki lists 68 total orbital launch attempts for China in 2024:
65 successes
2 failures
1 partial failure
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2024_in_spaceflight#By_country
Counting up the raw total, mission by mission, I do see where the 68 attempt total comes from. But the Wiki editor who updated it did not source out how they calculated that, and I never take anything from Wiki at face value without double checking the source.
There are four problematic launches to look at for 2024 YTD:
1. 2C-Y86 on March 13. Long March 2C. The YZ-1S upper stage experienced a failure; but the two satellites, DRO-A and DRO-B, ended up reaching their intended orbits, albeit after a few months of maneuvering.
2. Yunyao-1 15-17 on July 10/11. Hyperbola-1. Beijing-based iSpace later issued a release stating that the rocket’s fourth stage suffered an anomaly. This seems to be an indisputable launch failure.
3. 6A-Y21 Qianfan “Thousand Sails” on Aug. 6. Long March 6A. Upper stage failure resulted in a cloud of “thousands” of pieces of debris. This seems to be an indisputable launch failure.
4. Kinetica-1 on Dec. 26/27. Already discussed above. Indisputable launch failure.
So the Wiki claim of a “partial failure” is a puzzle to me, unless this is a characterization of the Long March 2C launch on March 13. But if it is, then I am short one total failure for them.
I’d be open to the argument that the March 13 launch is a success, since the satellites reached their intended orbits, but a significant performance failure of an upper stage gets called a “partial failure” by many in the industry.
Anyway, the result here is that we have plausible arguments for 64 successful orbital launches, or 65 successful orbital launches. But the others are failures, even by Chinese admission. I might be inclined to accept the 65 total Wiki gives, but asterisk the March 13 launch as a “partial success” as far as the Long March 2C is concerned.
Richard M: My post links to actual launch failures recorded by me, one of which was your #1. This however could be changed to a launch success, as the satellites did eventually reach their orbits.
#3 on your list was not a launch failure. It launched on August 6th and successfully deployed its satellites, by all reports. The upper stage then broke up shortly thereafter. If you have a confirmed source that confirms the break up occurred before deployment, please provide.
If #3 becomes a failure and #1 becomes a success, my count is still accurate. I would appreciate any help in finalizing these numbers.
Hello Bob!
Thank you for the reply.
I admit I was looking at just initial press reports on the Aug. 6 launch.
Checking around, especially on the NSF launch thread, it does seem that the satellites all deployed on Aug. 6, and the stage disintegrated on the following day (Aug. 7). Which is very bad, of course; but if this is the case, then it would seem, as you say, that we should call the 6A-Y21 Qianfan “Thousand Sails” launch on Aug. 6 a success. (Nonetheless, we sure as heck have to hope this sort of thing does not happen on every launch of the Qianfan constellation, given the number of launches we are talking about!!)
https://forum.nasaspaceflight.com/index.php?topic=60890.20
Jonathan McDowell lists these satellites from the August launch as being in orbit, too:
https://www.planet4589.org/space/con/qf/log.html
So, I stand corrected. The August 6 Qianfan *launch* apparently was a success. It was the disposal that was a mess.
So now we have to consider how we characterize the 2C-Y86/DRO-A, DRO-B launch on March 13? It *looks* like there is the sense that the Chinese salvaged this mission. (Sources below on this.) I think I could go either way: success, or partial failure. But that leaves us with either a total of 65 successful Chinese launches, or 66. Which, I guess, would have to modify your total as well (albeit not by much).
Space News reported on the attempt to salvage the satellites’ lunar trajectory here:
https://spacenews.com/china-appears-to-be-trying-to-save-stricken-spacecraft-from-lunar-limbo/
Jonathan McDowell lists them as being active on his master satellite catalog:
https://www.planet4589.org/space/gcat/data/cat/satcat.html
Space News reported again on August 20: “Two Chinese spacecraft appear to have successfully reached their intended lunar orbits despite an initial launch issue that left them stranded in low Earth orbit.” They include some tracking data from Space Delta 2.
https://spacenews.com/chinese-spacecraft-appear-to-reach-lunar-orbit-despite-launch-setback/
Richard M: Thank you for following this issue up. It seems to me that yes, I should change the March 13th launch from a failure to a success. I will amend my posts and my launch count.
Thank you again!
Richard M: As for the break-up of that Long March 6 upper stage, it is becoming a habit, something China should address but will probably not.
Hello Bob,
And yet, surely it is in their own interests to put a stop to it. To clog up their own orbits with large clouds of dangerous debris is a counterproductive behavior. To put it mildly. This isn’t just a tragedy of the commons — it’s a looming tragedy for *you*, too.
And I cannot doubt that the thought has occurred to someone over there, not least in the peeps overseeing the Qianfan program. But if decisive efforts are being made to resolve the upper stage issues on the Long March lines, there is not much evidence of it yet.
In the news
https://www.secretprojects.co.uk/threads/shenyang-chengdu-6th-gen-demonstrators.40872/page-18#post-740660