This week’s launch manifest will now feature twelve missions launching on nine different rockets, including the second launch of Blue Origin’s New Glenn rocket. This Roundup covers an eight day period, from Monday, Nov.3, to Monday, Nov. 10.
In addition to four Falcon 9 missions from SpaceX, an Ariane 62, New Glenn, Chang Zheng 7A, Chang Zheng 12, Ceres 1, Chang Zheng 11, Kinetica-1, and Electron are all scheduled to launch, with flights from China, French Guiana, New Zealand, and several launch sites in the United States.
On Monday, Nov. 3, at 03:47 UTC, a Chang Zheng 7A (CZ-7A) flew the first launch of this busy week. The CZ-7A lifted off from Launch Complex 201 at Wenchang Space Launch Site in China.
The rocket flew on an easterly trajectory, lifting its payload to a geostationary transfer orbit. The 58 m tall, three-stage CZ-7A features four strap-on liquid-fuelled boosters and a 2.5 m high, 4.2 m diameter fairing. The payload was a Chinese Earth observation satellite, Yaogan 46.
This mission marked the fifth flight of a CZ-7 in 2025, and the 255th orbital launch attempt of the year worldwide.
LAUNCH! Arianespace's Ariane 6 launches Sentinel-1D from ELA-4 at the Guiana Space Centre, French Guiana.
Overview:https://t.co/qPXLSs1Ap7
Live:https://t.co/XqURjULeTM pic.twitter.com/yRgyu7oh3O
— NSF – NASASpaceflight.com (@NASASpaceflight) November 4, 2025
The fourth flight of an Ariane 62 occurred on Tuesday, Nov. 4, at 21:02:17 UTC from Ensemble de Lancement Ariane 4 (ELA-4) at Guiana Space Center, French Guiana.
The two-stage Ariane 6 rocket, assisted by two strap-on solid rocket boosters, flew on a northern trajectory to place the 2,184 kg Sentinel-1D payload into a Sun-synchronous orbit (SSO).
Sentinel-1D will join its sibling, Sentinel-1C, in orbit. When fully commissioned, it will replace Sentinel-1A, which has been operating in orbit for 11 years — well beyond its planned mission lifetime.
Sentinel-1D and Sentinel-1C will generate data and imaging using a C-band synthetic aperture radar (SAR) instrument, which captures high-resolution imagery of Earth’s surface. The satellites are also equipped with an Automatic Identification System (AIS) instrument to improve the detection and tracking of marine vessels.
LIFTOFF for Electron and “The Nation God Navigates” mission for @QPS_inc pic.twitter.com/BdmKXLf7u8
— Rocket Lab (@RocketLab) November 5, 2025
Electron | QPS-SAR-14 The Nation God Navigates
Rocket Lab’s Electron made its 16th flight of 2025 on Wednesday, Nov. 5, at 19:51 UTC. Launching from Rocket Lab’s Launch Complex 1B (LC-1B) on the Māhia Peninsula in New Zealand, Electron flew on a southeasterly trajectory, lofting the 100 kg QPS-SAR satellite into a low-Earth orbit (LEO). After a 40-minute coasting period, the kick stage deployed QPS-SAR-14, nicknamed YACHIHOKO-I for the Japanese god of nation-building, to a 575 km circular LEO. This is the sixth QPS-SAR satellite launched by Electron for the Japanese company iQPS.
iQPS’s satellites are small, high-performance SAR satellites that use a lightweight, large, stowable antenna to collect high-resolution images of Earth through clouds and adverse weather conditions. Ultimately, the iQPS constellation is planned to have 36 satellites capable of monitoring specific fixed points on Earth every 10 minutes. The QPS-SAR satellite used a Rocket Lab Motorized Lightband as its separation system for deployment to space.
Electron is a two-stage rocket with an optional kick stage in use on this mission. The first stage features nine Rutherford sea-level engines, each producing 21 kN of thrust at liftoff and peaking at 25 kN (5,600 lbf) in flight. The second stage utilizes a Rutherford vacuum engine that produces 25.8 kN (5,800 lbf) of thrust. Both variants of Rutherford are powered by electric pumps instead of traditional gas turbines. The kick stage employs an unspecified bi-propellant Curie engine. Both the Rutherford and Curie engines are largely 3D-printed, and the two main stages are constructed of carbon composite.
LAUNCH: SpaceX Falcon 9 B1094-5 launches Starlink 6-81 from SLC-40.https://t.co/0gVSWZSVm2 https://t.co/pMK2plJjXm pic.twitter.com/UnGMNu8FJz
— NSF – NASASpaceflight.com (@NASASpaceflight) November 6, 2025
Falcon 9 | Starlink Group 6-81
The first SpaceX Falcon 9 of the week flew on Wednesday, Nov. 5, at 8:31:10 PM EST (Thursday, 01:31:10 UTC), lifting 29 v2 Mini Starlink satellites for the Starlink Group 6-81 mission into LEO. Falcon 9 launched from Space Launch Complex 40 (SLC-40) at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station (CCSFS) in Florida, and flew on a southeasterly trajectory.
Booster B1094 was flying for the fifth time, having previously flown the Starlink Group 12-10, Axiom Mission 4, Crew-11, and CRS NG-23 missions. Following stage separation, the booster landed atop the autonomous droneship Just Read The Instructions, which was stationed approximately 640 km downrange in the Atlantic Ocean, near The Bahamas. The booster will be returned to Port Canaveral for reuse.
Falcon 9 is a 3.9 m diameter, 70 m tall two-stage rocket. Nine Merlin 1D engines power the first stage booster, while the second stage utilizes a single vacuum-optimized Merlin engine. Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy are the first reusable orbital rockets, with one Falcon booster having flown 30 flights. The two payload fairings are also recovered and reused after flight.
Falcon 9 | Starlink Group 11-14
The second Starlink mission of this week launched on Thursday, Nov. 6, at 13:13 PM PST (21:13 UTC) from Space Launch Complex 4 East (SLC-4E) at the Vandenberg Space Force Base in California.
Falcon booster B1093 lofted 28 Starlink v2 Mini satellites into LEO after flying on a southeasterly trajectory. Following its ascent, the booster landed on SpaceX’s west coast droneship Of Course I Still Love You.
Booster B1093 was flying for the eighth time, having previously flown five Starlink missions and the Tranche 1 Transport Layer B and Tranche 1 Transport Layer C missions. B1083 first flew on April 7, 2025.
A problem with the booster’s liquid oxygen tank vent valve has caused the United Launch Alliance (ULA) to scrub the launch of an Atlas V on a second successive day. A new launch date of Thursday, Nov. 13, at 10:00 PM EST (Friday, 03:00 UTC) has now been announced.
Atlas V was previously set to launch on Wednesday, Nov. 5, at 10:24 PM EST (Thursday, Nov. 6, at 03:24 UTC), carrying a communications satellite for ViaSat. After this initial scrub, teams made a second attempt on Thursday, Nov. 6, at 10:16 PM EDT (03:16 UTC), but failed a second time.
When launched, Atlas V will fly due east from Space Launch Complex 41 (SLC-41) at the CCSFS in Florida. Lofting a 6,400 kg payload into geostationary Earth orbit requires the most powerful configuration of the Atlas V: the 551. The Atlas V 551 utilizes five strap-on solid rocket motors in addition to the two core stages. Unlike the Falcon 9, the Atlas V is not reusable; its solid rocket motors and first stage will fall back into the Atlantic and be destroyed after use during ascent.
The payload, ViaSat-3 F2, was built by Boeing. The ViaSat-3 constellation is comprised of three Ka-band satellites, each designed to rapidly shift capacity throughout its coverage area, delivering bandwidth where and when it’s needed most.
A Chinese Kinetica 1 rocket is now scheduled for liftoff on Sunday, Nov. 9, at 03:30 UTC. The four-stage, all-solid-propellant launch vehicle will fly due south out of Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center’s Site 130.
The payload flying on this mission is currently unknown.
Chang Zheng 11H | Unknown Payload
A Chinese rocket will launch from Chinese Coastal Waters at Haiyang Spaceport on Saturday, Nov. 8, at 21:00 UTC.
A currently unknown payload will be launched on a southeasterly trajectory aboard a Chang Zheng 11B (CZ-11B) rocket. The CZ-11H is a four-stage solid-propellant rocket, designed for sea-launch. Standing at a height of 29.8 m, the rocket can lift 700 kg into LEO.
Falcon 9 | Starlink Group 10-51
The next Starlink mission of the week, Starlink Group 10-51, is now scheduled to launch on Sunday, Nov. 9, at 3:10 AM EST (08:10 UTC) from Launch Complex 39A (LC-39A) at Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The new launch date follows a scrubbed attempt on Saturday, Nov. 8, at a similar time, which was pushed almost to the end of the four-hour launch window, and right through the count and propellant loading, before controllers finally abandoned the attempt due to weather conditions in the landing and recovery area.
Falcon booster B1069 will be flying its 28th mission, having previously flown the Hotbird 13F, OneWeb #15, SES-18 & SES-19, and 24 Starlink missions. B1069 first flew on Dec. 21, 2021.
Falcon 9 will fly on a northeasterly trajectory and deploy 29 v2 Mini Starlink satellites into LEO. Following launch, B1069 will land atop A Shortfall of Gravitas, which will be stationed approximately 640 km downrange in the Atlantic Ocean.
Love seeing New Glenn's seven BE-4 engines come alive! Congratulations to Team Blue on today's hotfire. We extended the hotfire duration this time to simulate the landing burn sequence by shutting down the non-gimballed engines after ramping down to 50 percent thrust, then… pic.twitter.com/iu0y6yYAnG
— Dave Limp (@davill) October 31, 2025
Following the successful completion of its stage one static fire test last week, the long-anticipated second flight of Blue Origin’s reusable New Glenn rocket has been rescheduled for Sunday, Nov. 9th, at 2:45 PM EST (19:45 UTC). Launching from Launch Complex 36 (LC-36) at THE CCSFS in Florida, booster GS1-SN002 will lift NASA’s Escape and Plasma Acceleration and Dynamics Explorers (ESCAPADE) dual-spacecraft mission into a heliocentric orbit. The combined payload mass is 1,070 kg.
Following ascent and stage-separation, GS1-SN002 will attempt to land atop Blue Origin’s recovery vessel Jacklyn. New Glenn’s first mission failed the landing attempt after controllers lost telemetry sometime after the entry burn started. Blue Origin later confirmed that the booster missed Jacklyn and was lost.
The two Rocket Lab-built ESCAPADE spacecraft will study ion and sputtered escape from Mars using three instruments. The science goals of the mission are to understand the processes controlling the structure of Mars’ hybrid magnetosphere and how it guides ion flows; understand how energy and momentum are transported from the solar wind through Mars’ magnetosphere; and understand the processes controlling the flow of energy and matter into and out of the collisional atmosphere. ESCAPADE is part of the NASA Small Innovative Missions for Planetary Exploration (SIMPLEx) program.
New Glenn will also host technology demonstrating Viasat’s InRange launch telemetry relay service as part of NASA’s Communications Services Project (CSP).
Chang Zheng 12 | Unknown Payload
China has two launches planned on Monday, Nov. 10, with a Chang Zheng 12 (CZ-12) scheduled to liftoff from Commercial Launch Complex 2 at Wenchang Space Launch Site in Hainan, China. The planned liftoff time is partway into a short launch window at 02:42 UTC. The window stretches from 02:35 until 03:03 UTC.
The payload for this mission remains uncertain, though the launch trajectory is expected to be southeasterly.
CZ-12 is a two-stage booster powered by kerosene and liquid oxygen. Four YF-100K engines power the first stage and two YF-115 engines power the second. The rocket is 59 m tall, and 3.8 m in diameter. This will be the third mission of CZ-12, which first flew in November 2024.
The second Chinese rocket is scheduled to launch on Monday, Nov. 10. A Ceres 1 will launch at 04:00 UTC carrying an as-yet-unknown payload from Site 95A at Jiuquan Satellite Launch Centre, and is expected to fly a southern trajectory.
The four-stage Ceres-1 (Gushenxing-1), with three solid-fueled stages and a single liquid-fueled upper stage, is capable of flying up to 300 kg into a 500 km altitude SSO. The rocket stands at a height of 19 m, and utilises a fairing of 1.4 m diameter and 2.5 m height.
This will be the sixth flight of a Ceres 1 in 2025.
Falcon 9 | Starlink Group 6-87
A SpaceX Falcon 9 will now launch from SLC-40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida on Monday, Nov. 10 at 10:00 PM EST (Tuesday, 03:00 UTC). This new liftoff time takes into account the new Federal Aviation Authority rules restricting all launches and re-entries to the night-time (10:00 PM to 6:00 AM local), which is due to come into effect on Monday for all commercial launches. The restrictions are expected to continue for the remainder of the current government shutdown.
Starlink Group 6-87 will consist of 29 v2-Mini satellites, and will fly southeasterly into a LEO. Booster B1096 will be supporting the mission and will land atop the droneship Just Read The Instructions which will be stationed near The Bahamas.
This will be the third flight of B1096, which first flew on July 16 supporting Project Kuiper (KF-01), and has also flown the IMAP & Others mission.
(Lead image: A SpaceX Falcon 9 lifts off with the Bandwagon-4 mission. Credit: Julia Bergeron for NSF)
