What is the significance of achieving the first rocket land recovery? Experts explain: China's space launch costs are expected to drop by more than 70%.

On August 20, CCTV News published an article titled "What Is the Significance of China's First Rocket Land Recovery? Expert Analysis."

The article quoted Wang Yanan, an aviation expert from Beihang University, stating that the Zhuque-3 Y-2 launch vehicle successfully completed its first controlled recovery of a first stage with landing legs on land. This launch holds great significance for China's aerospace industry, as it means the cost of Chinese space launches is expected to drop by more than 70%.

Within just over a month, China's rocket recovery technology has achieved breakthroughs in two directions: sea-based net recovery and land-based landing leg cushioning recovery.

The deeper significance lies in two aspects. First, China's future construction of large-scale space facilities requires rockets to operate at low cost and high efficiency. These technological breakthroughs provide capability support for the construction of large-scale space facilities in China.

Second, in the future global commercial space launch market, as China's rocket recoverability and reusability technologies continue to achieve breakthroughs and develop, China's aerospace industry will gain substantial competitiveness in the future commercial space market.

It is reported that the Zhuque-3 launch vehicle is a new-generation low-cost, high-capacity, high-frequency, reusable liquid oxygen methane launch vehicle model approved for project initiation by the China National Space Administration.

The rocket adopts a single-core, two-stage tandem configuration, with stainless steel as the primary material for the rocket body. It has a total length of 66.1 meters, a diameter of 4.5 meters, and a liftoff weight of 570 tons.

Approximately 137 seconds after liftoff of the Zhuque-3 Y-2, the first and second stages separated as programmed. Five seconds later, the second stage ignited and headed into space to continue the orbit insertion mission, while the first stage transitioned from ascent to return mode, flying toward the landing site for this mission.

Going forward, the Zhuque-3 will continue to accumulate data through recovered rocket body inspections, reuse flights, and more mission practice, providing launch capacity support for China's large-scale constellation networking and scaled commercial launches.