---
title: "China Successfully Launches Powerful Long March 5 Rocket"
description: "China successfully launched its largest and most powerful rocket, the Long March 5 Yaosan, after a 2017 attempt ended in failure."
date: "2019-12-27"
modified: "2019-12-27"
authors:
  - name: "Victor Tangermann"
    job_title: "Senior Editor"
    link: "https://futurism.com/authors/victor"
url: "https://futurism.com/the-byte/china-launches-powerful-long-march-5-rocket"
categories:
  - "Off-World"
  - "Space"
tags:
  - "china"
  - "long march-5"
  - "rocket"
  - "the digest"
---

# China Successfully Launches Powerful Long March 5 Rocket

![China successfully launched its largest and most powerful rocket, the Long March-5 Yaosan, after a 2017 attempt ended in failure.](<https://futurism.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/China-Launches-Powerful-Rocket.jpg>)
*\<em\>Image: CCT\</em\>*

## Long March 5

On Friday, China successfully launched a Long March 5 Yaosan rocket from Hainan, an island off the nation's southern coast.

The first March 5 rocket launched in 2016, but an attempt to launch another in July 2017 [ended mid-launch](<https://futurism.com/2017-us-led-world-successful-orbital-launches>) when the rocket's first stage engines failed, sending its payload into the ocean.

This successful launch puts China back on track to meet its future goals for space exploration.

## Testing Time

Friday's event was a big moment for China, with more than a million people streaming live coverage of the rocket launch online, as [*AFP* reports](<https://phys.org/news/2019-12-china-powerful-rocket-boost-mars.html>).

The March 5 delivered a single test satellite into orbit, but the rocket is capable of lugging 25 tonnes of cargo into space, giving it about the same payload capacity as NASA's most powerful rocket to date, the [Delta IV](<https://www.ulalaunch.com/rockets/delta-iv>).

## To the Moon and Beyond

China has big plans for the March 5.

For one, it aims to use the rocket to launch its first ever Mars probe and lunar return sample mission, [according to *Al Jazeera*](<https://www.aljazeera.com/ajimpact/china-long-march-5-rocket-fly-191227190943591.html>). It also plans to use a modified version of the Long March 5 rocket to begin establishing a [crewed space station](<https://futurism.com/the-byte/china-announces-space-station-launch>) in 2022.

The rocket will also play a role in [China's plans](<https://www.space.com/china-new-spacecraft-crewed-moon-missions.html>) to send its own astronauts to the Moon in the late 2020s.

**READ MORE:** [China's Long March 5 rocket can fly](<https://www.aljazeera.com/ajimpact/china-long-march-5-rocket-fly-191227190943591.html>) \[*Al Jazeera*\]

**More on China's space ambitions:** *[China Unveils Plan to Send Astronauts to Mars](<https://futurism.com/the-byte/china-plans-send-astronauts-mars>)*

## Author
I've been at Futurism since 2017, where my role has evolved to encompass design, writing, and increasingly editing. I've always been fascinated by space exploration and advanced transportation, which I've leaned into by interviewing luminaries in those fields while closely following the dimensions of policy and regulation that allow next-generation projects to succeed -- or, sometimes, to fail. I'm also keenly interested in the effects of generative AI on society, policies, and democratic institutions, as well as clean energy, physics and biology, and the vagaries of tech leadership. My work for Futurism has been cited by publications including Ars Technica, Gizmodo, PC Magazine, Jalopnik, Fox News, and the New York Post. I spent my childhood living in locations including Manila, the Philippines, and Geneva, Switzerland, attended McGill University, and now live in Toronto, Canada. Before Futurism I worked at AskMen and a small photography studio. In my free time, I'm an avid gardener, foodie, and craft beer lover, as well as a maker of artisanal hot pepper sauces. I have a magnificent dog named Freida.

### Author social links  
[Bluesky](<https://bsky.app/profile/vtanger.bsky.social>)