Long March 5

A standard Long March 5 will be used to launch the Tianwen-1 orbiter and rover into a Mars transfer orbit from Wenchang in late July or early August.

The Long March 5, 6, and 7 variants use combinations of liquid hydrogen or kerosene fuel with liquid oxygen and are part of a new generation of Chinese launch vehicles intended to eventually replace older hypergolic Long March launchers.

The 5-meter-diameter Long March 5 core stage is powered by two YF-77 hydrolox engines.

A YF-77 turbopump issue caused the failure of the second Long March 5 in 2017 and delayed the test launch of the Long March 5B and the Chang’e-5 lunar sample mission.

Tianwen-1 is expected to launch on a Long March 5 launcher from Wenchang in the late July–early August Mars launch window.

An issue with YF-100 engines could potentially impact planned Long March 5 missions including China's first independent interplanetary mission to Mars scheduled for July.

China expected to conduct more than 40 orbital launches in 2020, including flights of the Long March 5.

Two flights of the standard Long March 5, which is used for higher orbits, were planned in 2020.

The YF-77 hydrolox engines for the Long March 5 completed a 100-second ground test on 2020-01-19.

The first 2020 Long March 5 flight, in late July, will launch China’s first mission to Mars.

Chang’e-5 was originally scheduled to launch in late 2017 but was delayed by the failure of the second Long March 5 in 2017-07-01.

The Long March 5 is cleared to launch China’s first independent interplanetary mission, a Mars orbiter and rover, during a narrow launch window across late July to early 2020-08-01.

The Long March 5 failed on its second flight in 2017-07-01, delaying the Chang’e-5 lunar sample return mission and the construction of the Chinese Space Station.

The first flight of the Long March 5B, a Low Earth Orbit variant of Long March 5 developed for LEO missions, will occur in 2020 with a test payload of an uncrewed test of a new generation crewed spacecraft capable of journeys to deep space.

The third Long March 5 was delivered to the Wenchang launch center in late October.

The Tianhe core module has a mass of 20 metric tons and was previously slated for launch in 2018 before the 2017 Long March 5 failure.

The Long March 5 launched from the Wenchang Satellite Launch Center in south China at 7:45 a.m. Eastern.

The Long March 5 is capable of delivering 14 metric tons to geostationary transfer orbit and 8.2 metric tons to trans-lunar injection.