On January 11, China successfully launched the new Gravity-1 rocket, created by the Chinese company Orienspace. A massive rocket rose into the sky from the deck of a ship standing in the Yellow Sea.

Gravity-1 can deliver about 6,500 kg of payload to low Earth orbit. It became China’s most powerful commercial rocket, as well as the most powerful solid-fuel launch vehicle ever to perform an orbital mission. The full weight of Gravity-1 is 405 tons, and the total thrust at the start is 600 tons. Previously, as a rule, China launched missiles of smaller classes from sea platforms.

As part of its first mission, Gravity-1 successfully launched its payload of three Yunyao-1 commercial weather satellites into its planned orbit. The Galaxy-1 launch was China’s fourth orbital mission this year. Recently, the country has increased its launch rate to impressive levels, with the private sector playing an increasingly important role. In 2022, China launched 64 orbital missions, and then broke this national record by launching 67 missions in 2023.

Orienspace is also developing several other rockets. The Gravity-2 version will have a liquid-fueled active stage and solid-fuel rocket boosters. It is expected that the rocket will be able to launch about 22.6 tons into low Earth orbit. The company plans to carry out the first launch of Gravity-2 in 2025. In addition, work is underway on Gravity-3, which will combine the 3 main stages of Gravity-2, similar to how the Falcon Heavy includes 3 Falcon 9 boosters linked together. The payload of Gravity-3 will be about 30.6 tons .

For comparison, Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy can deliver about 25 tons and 70 tons of cargo to low Earth orbit, respectively.

Source: space