The Jilin-1 satellite is described as a high-resolution, ultra-wide optical remote-sensing satellite, capable of providing imagery with 0.5-meter resolution and a 150-km swath width. The satellite has already delivered high resolution imagery<\/a> of a high latitude area of Russia. The two Shutian Yuxing satellites<\/a> are based on Geespace\u2019s GSP50 50-kilogram-class general purpose platform.<\/p>\n The launch is only the second orbital mission for Orienspace, founded in 2020, following the January 2024 debut flight<\/a> of the Gravity-1. The company says the rocket underwent multiple internal upgrades along with improved quality stability, production consistency and reliability. Orienspace also provided an official company livestream<\/a> of the mission, which is uncommon for Chinese launches.<\/p>\n The bulky Gravity-1 rocket consists of three stages and four boosters. It has the capability to loft around 6,500 kg of payload to low Earth orbit (LEO), or 3,700 kg to 700-km sun-synchronous orbit (SSO), when using a kerosene-liquid oxygen third stage.<\/p>\n Geespace last month completed<\/a> the 64-satellite first phase of an Internet of Things constellation with the launch of a Jielong-3 rocket, also from the Haiyang Oriental Spaceport.<\/p>\n Orienspace says the successful second launch further validated its reliability and capacity for sea-based, multi-satellite constellation deployments. The company is one of a plethora of commercial launch startups aiming to secure contracts to launch satellites for China\u2019s megaconstellation projects, namely Guowang and Qianfan, or Thousand Sails.<\/p>\n The company raised between $27 million and $124 million in B-round funding<\/a> in August to further support its ambitions, namely the liquid propellant Gravity-2 launcher, which could have its test flight before the end of the year. There has since been a boom in funding Chinese commercial launch companies, including record rounds for Galactic Energy<\/a> and Space Pioneer.<\/p>\n The reusable Gravity-2 is a 70 meters tall, two-stage reusable kerosene-liquid oxygen propellant rocket with a core diameter of 4.2 meters and a 5.2-meter-wide payload fairing. The company performed a first stage static fire test<\/a> in July.<\/p>\n According to earlier statements, the Gravity-2 (if powered by nine Yuanli-85 engines as originally planned) can carry 21,500 kg to LEO or 15,000 kg to 500-km SSO. A variant with solid side boosters would be capable of sending 29,000 kg to LEO or around 20,000\u202fkg to SSO. Gravity-2 is just one of a number of new commercial rockets targeting debut flights before the end of the year.<\/p>\n Friday\u2019s launch was China\u2019s 60th orbital launch attempt of 2025, which includes a single failure. The next activity is expected to be a Long March 8A and Long March 12 launches from the commercial spaceport on Hainan island. China is expected to close out the year<\/a> with further hardware tests related to its crewed lunar program and debut flights of new and potentially reusable launch vehicles from both state-owned and commercial launch service providers.<\/p>\n \n\tRelated<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"HELSINKI \u2014 Chinese launch startup Orienspace successfully conducted its second launch late Friday, with a Gravity-1 solid rocket…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":74192,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[114,49216,61,60,38350,82,1935,49217,247],"class_list":{"0":"post-74191","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-space","8":"tag-china","9":"tag-gravity-1","10":"tag-ie","11":"tag-ireland","12":"tag-orienspace","13":"tag-science","14":"tag-sn","15":"tag-solid-rocket","16":"tag-space"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74191","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=74191"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74191\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/74192"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=74191"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=74191"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=74191"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"YouTube](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/1760201109_574_hqdefault.jpg\")
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