China's Commercial CERES-1 Rocket Launches Remote Sensing Satellite by Sea

China's Commercial CERES-1 Rocket Launches Remote Sensing Satellite by Sea

China's Galactic Energy launched a CERES-1 Y8 carrier rocket on October 21, 2026, at 11:39am (China Standard Time) from its sea launch vessel in the Yellow Sea off the coast of Rizhao City in east China's Shandong Province, successfully placing the remote-sensing Xiguang-4 satellite into its planned 541km low Earth orbit (LEO).

The Taiyuan Satellite Launch Center carried out this offshore launch. The Xiguang-4 satellite will image the city of Guangzhou in China's southern Guangdong province and surrounding regions. The satellite is from Guangdong Tianyuan Technology Co. Ltd. with support from Guangzhou University and the municipal government of Guangzhou. The satellite will collect imagery for ecological monitoring, disaster response and planning, agricultural support, and urban planning. For those tasks, Xiguang-4-01 is equipped with a 0.5-meter resolution optical camera, a 2-meter multispectral camera, and a 30-meter swath infrared imager. This is said to enable a ‘full-spectrum quantitative’ observation system.

Today’s launch was the 7th mission for Ceres-1S, the 24th launch for the Ceres-1 launch vehicle series (Ceres-1 and Ceres-1S), the 25th flight of the Ceres family of launch vehicles (Ceres-1 and Ceres-2), and Galactic Energy’s 26th orbital launch attempt. This was also the 73rd launch from China in 2026.

Video Credit: Galactic Energy
Duration: 1 minute
Release Date: Oct. 21, 2026

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