LandSpace's landed Zhuque-3 Y2 booster fell over and was damaged within hours
As the brief logged it
China-in-space.com (Aug 22) reports the first-stage booster LandSpace recovered on Aug 18/19 — its first-ever land-based recovery, pushed earlier as the second Chinese reusability method — toppled after standing only a few hours (Copernicus imagery confirms ≥4h upright), with a propellant-vent fire, a holed lower tank, two deformed TQ-12A nozzles, and grid-fin/inter-stage damage; recovery teams may have felled it deliberately for safety. LandSpace had stated it wanted to reuse this booster. Single-source, explicitly speculative ("speculation aplenty," "supposed leaked images"), so held well below push — but it directly tempers the Aug 18/19 milestone: a *landing* is not a *reflight*, and the stated 6-month reflight target now carries added hardware risk. A mild, provisional cost-curve reprieve for Western operators, not a reversal of the Chinese reusability trajectory (Long March 10B's July sea-net capture is unaffected).
Provenance
Logged in the brief of 23 August 2026.
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