Launch week: August 10-16, 2026
Six launches have dated UTC slots this week, led by the weather-sensitive QZS-7 mission and a dense August 10 cluster; a separate provisional R-1 listing is kept clearly apart from the confirmed calendar.
Six launches have a dated slot in the August 10–16, 2026 UTC calendar: four fall on August 10, one on August 12, and one on August 16. A separate Next Spaceflight record adds a provisional August 15 Falcon 9 listing, but it is not on the site's current upcoming-launch list and has no independent confirmation. 12
All times below are UTC.
NET means no earlier than; TBD means the source has not settled or disclosed the field. The main uncertainty this week is not the number of entries but their confidence: JAXA has just moved QZS-7 because of weather, three listings keep payload details undisclosed or uncertain, and SpaceX's Globalstar mission has a primary target plus a local-time backup opportunity.Quick schedule
| UTC date and time | Mission / vehicle | Launch organisation | Site and pad | Payload and destination | Status and webcast |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Aug 10, 12:00 Window 11:54–13:12 | Unknown Payload Long March 7A | CASC listing | Wenchang Space Launch Site, LC-201 | Payload, customer and destination orbit undisclosed; the record flags vehicle and payload identity as uncertain. | Scheduled listing; no stream shown. 3 |
| Aug 10, 15:07 Window 14:49–18:49 | Starlink Group 10-19 Falcon 9 Block 5 | SpaceX | Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, SLC-40 | 29 Starlink v2-mini satellites to low Earth orbit. 4 | 83% Go for Launch in the fetched mission record. The SpaceX mission page says the webcast starts about 10 minutes before liftoff. |
| Aug 10, 19:23 Window 19:00–20:30 | Michibiki 7 / QZS-7 H3-22S | Mitsubishi Heavy Industries for Japan's QZSS programme | Tanegashima Space Center, Yoshinobu Launch Complex / LA-Y2 | Japanese Quasi-Zenith Satellite System navigation satellite to geostationary transfer orbit; the mission also carries the U.S. Space Force SACHI hosted instrument. 5 | Rescheduled for weather from the original August 10 JST attempt. JAXA now gives August 11, 04:23:31 JST, which is August 10, 19:23:31 UTC. The JAXA countdown page carries the live-broadcast information. 6 |
| Aug 10, 23:45 Window 23:37–Aug 11, 00:14 | Flight 2 ZhuQue-3 | Landspace | Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center, Site 96B | Second test launch of the ZhuQue-3; payload identities are TBD. Target orbit: low Earth orbit. | Planned, but the source says assignment to this launch window is uncertain. No stream listed. 7 |
| Aug 12, 02:00 Window 02:00–06:00 | Starlink Group 17-49 Falcon 9 Block 5 | SpaceX | Vandenberg Space Force Base, SLC-4E | 24 Starlink v2-mini satellites to sun-synchronous orbit. 8 | Delayed from August 10 and 11 in the Spaceflight Now schedule. The official SpaceX mission page says the webcast starts about 10 minutes before liftoff. 2 |
| Aug 15, 21:52 Window closes Aug 16, 02:35 Provisional | R-1 Falcon 9 Block 5 | SpaceX listing | Vandenberg Space Force Base, SLC-4E | Possible classified LEO satellites for a U.S. government customer; payload identities are explicitly very uncertain and details are TBD. | Standalone Next Spaceflight record, absent from its current upcoming list; no independent confirmation or webcast was found. 9 |
| Aug 16, 01:12 Window 01:12–01:27 | Globalstar 2-R Mission 1 Falcon 9 Block 5 | SpaceX | Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, SLC-40 | Nine Globalstar second-generation refresh satellites, 4,500 kg total, to low Earth orbit. MDA and Rocket Lab built the spacecraft; Globalstar is the operator. 10 | SpaceX is targeting Saturday, August 15 at 9:12 p.m. Eastern Time, which is August 16, 01:12 UTC. A local-time backup on August 16 would fall outside this UTC week. The SpaceX mission page says the webcast starts about 15 minutes before liftoff. 11 |
Mission cards
QZS-7: the weather move is part of the schedule
JAXA's August 8 notice moved the H3-9 launch from August 10 to August 11 Japan Standard Time because the required weather conditions might not be met. The agency's countdown page now shows 04:23:31 JST on August 11, so the calendar slot is 19:23:31 UTC on August 10. The reserved period begins August 12 JST and runs through August 31, then resumes September 3–30. 612
This is the week's best watch-now entry for two practical reasons: the time is first-party and precise, and JAXA and Japan's Cabinet Office have announced a live broadcast. Weather remains an active constraint, not a historical footnote.
Flight 2: a second ZhuQue-3 test with no public payload
Landspace's second ZhuQue-3 flight is scheduled from Site 96B at Jiuquan at 23:45 UTC on August 10. The mission record identifies the target as low Earth orbit but says the payload identities are TBD and that assignment to this launch window is uncertain. That makes it a vehicle-test watch rather than a payload story. 7
Globalstar 2-R: a constellation refresh outside the Starlink run
The Globalstar mission carries nine second-generation satellites, rather than a Starlink batch. Next Spaceflight lists MDA and Rocket Lab as manufacturers and Globalstar as operator; SpaceX's page gives the primary Saturday evening Eastern Time target, a 15-minute window, and a landing at Landing Zone 40. The UTC conversion puts the primary attempt just after midnight on Sunday, August 16. 1011
R-1: keep this reminder separate
The R-1 record is useful because it gives a precise August 15, 21:52 UTC slot and a pad, but its own notes say the payload identities are very uncertain. It also does not appear in the current Next Spaceflight list used for broad recall, and no second source returned it. Keep it on a watch list; do not treat it as a confirmed mission profile. 9
Watch priorities
- QZS-7 first. Put August 10, 19:23 UTC on the calendar, then check JAXA again before the window. The mission has the clearest first-party time and a dedicated broadcast page, but weather can still move it. 612
- The August 10 cluster. Four entries run from 12:00 to 23:45 UTC. The two SpaceX missions have named payloads and webcast destinations; the Long March 7A and ZhuQue-3 entries are better treated as cadence and vehicle-test markers because their payload information is incomplete. 347
- Globalstar 2-R on Sunday UTC. The mission has a defined primary target, a short launch window, a named landing zone, and a direct SpaceX webcast. If it slips to the announced local-time backup, it moves outside this issue's UTC week. 11
- Starlink 17-49 only after checking delay status. Its August 12 window is the current listing, but Spaceflight Now records earlier August 10 and 11 dates. 2
Coverage notes
The six main entries come from the current Next Spaceflight list and its mission-detail pages, with JAXA's first-party notice overriding the older month-only QZS-7 entry. Spaceflight Now independently lists the three Falcon 9 schedule points it covers and records Starlink 17-49's earlier delays. The R-1 record is kept separately because it appears in a detail-page search but not in the current upcoming list. 126
The UTC boundary also matters for the Long March 12 listing: its mission page gives August 17, 02:00 UTC, even though a local-time search result presents the event as Sunday, August 16. It is therefore outside the August 10–16 UTC window. 13
No dated launch in this week was found on the NASA events page, the ESA Ariane archive, Arianespace's current MTG-I2 notice, Rocket Lab's launch page, or ISRO's launch-missions table. Their nearest relevant dated entries are Roman Space Telescope on August 30, MTG-I2 on August 27, Rocket Lab's iQPS mission in late August, and no matching ISRO mission in the accessible table. 1415161718
Blue Origin's missions page returned a security checkpoint rather than a readable schedule in this pass. NASA's events page lists Blue Origin's Blue Moon Mark 1 only as a 2026 entry without a day inside this week, so no dated Blue Origin launch is included here. 1419
Launch dates, windows and webcasts can change after publication. Recheck the operator page—especially JAXA for QZS-7 and SpaceX for the Falcon 9 missions—before setting an alarm.
References
- 1Next Spaceflight - current launch list
nextspaceflight.com
- 2Spaceflight Now - Launch Schedule
spaceflightnow.com
- 3Next Spaceflight - Unknown Payload / Long March 7A
nextspaceflight.com
- 4Next Spaceflight - Starlink Group 10-19
nextspaceflight.com
- 5Next Spaceflight - Michibiki 7
nextspaceflight.com
- 6JAXA - QZS-7 rescheduled launch schedule
global.jaxa.jp
- 7Next Spaceflight - Flight 2 / ZhuQue-3
nextspaceflight.com
- 8Next Spaceflight - Starlink Group 17-49
nextspaceflight.com
- 9Next Spaceflight - R-1
nextspaceflight.com
- 10Next Spaceflight - Globalstar 2-R Mission 1
nextspaceflight.com
- 11SpaceX - Globalstar 2-R Launch 1 Mission
spacex.com
- 12JAXA - QZS-7 countdown page
fanfun.jaxa.jp
- 13Next Spaceflight - Unknown Payload / Long March 12
nextspaceflight.com
- 14NASA - Events
nasa.gov
- 15ESA - Ariane archive
esa.int
- 16Arianespace - MTG-I2 mission notice
newsroom.arianespace.com
- 17Rocket Lab - Launches
rocketlabusa.com
- 18ISRO - Launch Missions
isro.gov.in
- 19Blue Origin - Missions
blueorigin.com
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