Launch week: June 9–15, 2026

Seven confirmed launches fill the June 9–15 window, spread across four countries and five vehicles. Japan's H3-30S — the first H3 variant to fly without solid rocket boosters — is the technical headline, flying Thursday morning from Tanegashima in a configuration JAXA needs to succeed before an October Mars moon mission. SpaceX logs three Falcon 9 Starlink sorties, one of which marks the 650th Falcon 9 flight overall. China runs two missions in 24 hours with classified payloads on a commercial methalox rocket and the country's heaviest lifter. Rocket Lab flies a classified hypersonic test from Virginia.

One launch you won't see this week: South Korea's Agency for Defense Development (ADD) solid-fuel SLV was scheduled here as recently as June 8 in last week's roundup and is now off the calendar indefinitely — see "Breaking" below.

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Block 2 extends the first-stage propellant tanks, uses fully subcooled methane and LOX loading, and supports three second-stage ignitions for orbital disposal — changes from the original Zhuque-2 design that Landspace introduced after the Y3 failure in August 2025, which ended with self-destruct due to a second-stage voltage fault. The most recent flight, ZhuQue-2E Y5 on May 14, 2026, carried a mass simulator from this same pad. 2

Three launches on the same calendar day — Japan, China, and SpaceX — make this the busiest single day of the week.

The H3-30S removes the solid rocket boosters entirely, relying on three liquid-fueled LE-9 engines for liftoff. Launch cost is listed at approximately $50 million. 3 The December 2025 H3 failure (QZS-5 loss, caused by adhesive delamination in the payload support structure) is what this flight needs to clear before JAXA can proceed with the MMX (Martian Moons eXploration) sample-return mission, targeted for October 2026. Miss that window and the next Mars alignment opens in late 2028. 5

The Long March 5 is CASC's largest operational rocket. Its 10,565 kN liftoff thrust and 5.2-meter fairing make it the vehicle of choice for China's lunar, interplanetary, and large-satellite programs; the payload here is not publicly disclosed. The previous Long March 5 flight set the pad's fastest turnaround at Wenchang at 57 days and 22 hours. 6

HASTE is Rocket Lab's suborbital Electron variant purpose-built for U.S. defense hypersonic development programs. The mission name "Curveball" is the only public identifier; payload, trajectory, and customer remain classified. 9

South Korea's ADD solid-fuel SLV — listed in last week's roundup as targeting June 8 from an offshore platform near Jeju Island — has no new launch date. On June 1, 2026, an explosion at the Hanwha Aerospace propulsion plant in Daejeon killed five workers and injured two others during propellant tool cleaning in building 56-dong. 12

Hanwha Aerospace is the prime contractor for the SLV's solid-fuel propulsion systems. The planned 4th test — the first full-configuration orbital flight, intended to carry a 100 kg synthetic aperture radar (SAR) reconnaissance satellite to a 500 km sun-synchronous orbit from the offshore sea-launch platform — depended on that facility. 13 South Korea's defense ministry and ADD have not issued an updated launch timeline.

Blue Origin CEO Dave Limp posted a recovery status update on June 1, two days after the May 28 NG-4 static-fire explosion destroyed the vehicle and damaged LC-36 at Cape Canaveral. 14

According to Limp, the propellant farm, oxygen/hydrogen/LNG tanks, and water tower are in good shape; the main support tower sustained damage but can be repaired in place. The booster "Never Tell Me The Odds" and three GS-2 second stages in the integration facility were not affected. Blue Origin will also eliminate the transporter-erector and switch to an alternative vertical integration method. The company is not changing production rate or switching configurations — 7×2 manufacturing continues. 14

SpacePolicyOnline.com noted that Blue Origin still needs to identify and fix the root cause, repair its only orbital pad, and return to flight — calling the timeline "a tall order." 5 The FAA confirmed no new investigation is required, as the static fire was not conducted under an active launch license. 15

Six missions remain unconfirmed for any date this month. None has slipped into the June 9–15 window as of June 8. 16