Tag: China
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Long March 2D lofts Yaogan Weixing-24 for China
The Chinese have launched yet another spy satellite, this time via a Long March 2D rocket. The launch of Yaogan Weixing-24 “remote sensing” satellite comes just six days after they orbited the Yaogan-23 spacecraft. This latest launch occurred at 0712UTC on Thursday, lifting off from the 603 Launch Pad of the LC43 Launch Complex at…
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Chinese military satellite launched by Long March rocket
The Long March 2C rocket lifts off at 2:53 a.m. Beijing time Saturday (1853 GMT Friday) from the Taiyuan launch center. Credit: Xinhua China launched a Long March rocket last week with a satellite Western analysts believe will conduct all-weather global radar surveillance for the Chinese military. The Long March 2C rocket lifted off at…
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Chinese probe returns from flight around the moon
Ground teams in China inspect the a space capsule after its return from a flight around the moon. Credit: Xinhua/Ren Junchuan Completing an eight-day test flight around the moon to verify technologies for a planned lunar sample return mission, an unpiloted Chinese space capsule re-entered Earth’s atmosphere at blazing speed Friday and parachuted to a…
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China launches third space mission in a week
A Long March 2C rocket lifted off at 0659 GMT (2:59 a.m. EDT; 2:59 p.m. Beijing time) Monday with a Chinese military satellite. Credit: Xinhua China put an experimental Shijian military satellite into orbit Monday on top of a Long March rocket, marking the third Chinese space launch in a week. The Shijian 11-08 spacecraft…
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First commercial mission to the moon launched from China
Artist’s concept of the Manfred Memorial Moon Mission, which remains attached to the upper stage of a Long March 3C rocket for a flight around the moon. Credit: LuxSpace A modest privately-funded instrument package built by a company in Luxembourg became the first commercial to the moon to get off the ground with a fiery…
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Chinese probe launched on round-trip flight to the moon
A Chinese Long March 3C rocket lifted off at 1800 GMT (2 p.m. EDT; 2 a.m. Beijing time). Credit: Xinhua China launched a demonstrator probe Thursday on a round-trip flight around the moon to test out a heat shield and landing capsule planned for use on a lunar sample return mission in 2017. The unmanned…
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China launches another secretive Shijian-11 mission
The Chinese have orbited a new satellite from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center on Sunday. Utilizing their Long March 2C (Chang Zheng 2C) launch vehicle, the mission involved another of the secretive Shijian-11 (SJ-11) series of “experimental satellites”. Launch took place at 05:13 UTC according to Chinese reports. Chinese Launch: This is the seventh in…
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Long March 4B lofts Yaogan-21 in surprise launch
The Chinese have conducted another surprise launch, this time with the Long March 4B rocket reported to have lofted a new satellite in the Yaogan Weixing series. The Yaogan-21 satellite was launched at 03:22 UTC on Monday from the LC9 launch complex at the Taiyuan satellite Launch Center. Chinese Launch: As usual for this type of…
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China returns to action with Yaogan Weixing-20 mission
Closing a four month gap since the previous orbital launch, China successfully launched the Yaogan Weixing-20 mission from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center. Launch took place on Saturday at 05:45 UTC from the 603 launch pad of the LC43 launch complex using a Long March-4C (Chang Zheng-4C) launch vehicle. Chinese Launch: The Yaogan Weixing-20 mission…
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China opens 2014 campaign with secretive satellite launch
The Chinese finally opened their 2014 campaign with the launch of a Shijian-11 class satellite. A Chang Zheng 2C (Long March 2C) rocket lofted a mysterious satellite – understood to be part of the Shijian-11 series of early warning satellites – from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center’s 603 launch pad at the LC43 launch complex at 02:46 UTC. Chinese Launch: This…