Family: Long March
Long March 4B
Launch statistics
- 57
- Launches (as of July 27, 2026)
- 1
- Successes
- 0
- Failures
- 100.0 %
- Success rate
The Long March 4B, also known as Chang Zheng 4B, CZ-4B or LM-4B, is a Chinese expendable three-stage orbital launch vehicle built by the Shanghai Academy of Spaceflight Technology. It belongs to the Long March family and is the basis from which the later Long March 4C was derived. It is a vehicle from the generation preceding China's kerolox rockets: all three stages burn nitrogen tetroxide and UDMH, storable hypergolic propellants. The 27.91-metre first stage carries four YF-21C engines; the second combines a main engine with four vernier engines for fine control; the third, 2.9 metres in diameter, uses two YF-40 engines. The stack stands 44.1 metres tall by 3.35 metres in diameter and lifts off at 249,200 kg. Its routine job is placing satellites into low Earth orbit and, above all, sun-synchronous orbits, with capacities of 4,200 kg to LEO, 2,800 kg to SSO and 1,500 kg to geostationary transfer orbit. It remains active and operates from several Chinese centres: Taiyuan, Jiuquan and Xichang. It is one of the longest-serving workhorses of the Chinese space programme, with a record of nearly three decades of continuous service devoted largely to weather, earth-resources and observation satellites.
History
First flight and inaugural payload
The Long March 4B lifted off for the first time on 10 May 1999 from the Taiyuan Satellite Launch Center, carrying the Fengyun 1C weather satellite alongside Shijian 5. That inaugural satellite would gain notoriety years later: in 2007 it was the target China chose for its anti-satellite missile test, an episode that generated one of the largest orbital debris clouds in history.
Sustained service
From its debut the vehicle became a routine tool of the Chinese space programme, flying between one and five missions a year for more than two decades. Its cadence rested on the simplicity of a hypergolic architecture inherited from the Long March 4 series, which allows the rocket to be kept loaded and operated from existing infrastructure. Its most frequent payloads have been satellites of the Fengyun, Ziyuan, CBERS — the joint Sino-Brazilian earth observation programme — HaiYang and Yaogan series.
The single failure
The CZ-4B's record is remarkably clean: 57 launches with 56 successes and a single failure. That failure occurred on 9 December 2013 and caused the loss of CBERS-3, jointly developed by China and Brazil, which never reached its intended orbit.
Current status
Despite the arrival of China's new-generation launchers — the Long March 5, 6, 7 and 8, with cleaner propellants — the Long March 4B remains in service. It has also broadened its operating bases beyond Taiyuan, flying from Jiuquan and Xichang as well. The most recent launch recorded in the article consulted is dated 1 July 2026, confirming that the veteran vehicle still has a place in the Chinese catalogue more than twenty-five years after its debut.
Launch timeline
| Date | Launch site | Outcome | Payload |
|---|---|---|---|
| Jul 1, 2026, 11:46 PM | Launch Area 94 (SLS-2 / 603) | Success | Haiyang 2E (Chinese: "Ocean"), abbreviated HY-2E, is a marine remote sensing satellite of China. The HY-2 series' primary objective is to measure ocean dynamic and regional environmental trends in the microwave spectral range, plus measurements of parameters such as marine wind vector, marine surface heat and Sea Surface Temperature (SST). These ocean dynamics real-time data aid aero-marine forecasts for the prevention of, and relief in the event of, natural disasters. Instruments carried include: * Microwave Radiometer Imager (MWRI) * Radar Altimeter (RA) * Ku-band Rotational Fan-beam Scatterometer (SCAT) |
Images