China's Reusable Pallas-1 Rocket Reaches Orbit on Debut Flight

Galactic Energy, a Beijing-based rocket company, launched its Pallas-1 rocket for the first time on August 31, 2026, lifting off from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in northwest China. About 30 minutes after liftoff, the company said on social media that the rocket had entered its planned orbit.

The two-stage Pallas-1 stands 171 feet (52 meters) tall and can carry about 15,400 pounds (7,000 kilograms) to low Earth orbit, the region of space just above the atmosphere where most satellites operate. Galactic Energy did not disclose what payload, if any, the rocket carried on its debut flight, and said Pallas-1 is meant to become one of its core rockets for launching large satellite constellations.

Reuse is central to the rocket's design. Like SpaceX's Falcon 9, the Pallas-1 booster is built to fly up to 25 times, steering itself back to Earth with hypersonic grid fins before touching down on deployable landing legs. The company made no landing attempt on this first flight and is targeting the second half of 2027 for that milestone.

Galactic Energy said the launch marks its entry into a new development stage that combines solid and liquid propellants through a dual-engine approach. The company already operates the smaller Ceres-1 rocket, which has flown 23 times to launch small satellites.

Pallas-1 is not the first Chinese rocket to land during an orbital mission. The first stage of the Long March 10B settled onto a net on a ship at sea on July 10, and the privately built Zhuque-3 rocket, developed by the Beijing startup LandSpace, landed on legs on August 18. Several other Chinese companies — CAS Space, Deep Blue Aerospace, iSpace, Orienspace and Space Pioneer — are also developing partially reusable rockets.