{"id":11878,"date":"2021-02-07T18:16:55","date_gmt":"2021-02-07T10:16:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp-productionenv-bjg9h2g2bgg5b8aa.southeastasia-01.azurewebsites.net\/news\/china-launches-military-satellite-toward-geostationary-orbit\/"},"modified":"2021-02-07T18:16:55","modified_gmt":"2021-02-07T10:16:55","slug":"china-launches-military-satellite-toward-geostationary-orbit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/news\/china-launches-military-satellite-toward-geostationary-orbit\/","title":{"rendered":"China launches military satellite toward geostationary orbit"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"
A Long March 3B rocket takes off with the TJS 6 satellite. Credit: CASC<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

A mysterious Chinese government satellite, believed to be a military-operated early warning station, successfully launched into orbit Feb. 4 on top of a Long March 3B rocket.<\/p>\n

The three-stage, 184-foot-tall (55-meter) rocket lifted off from the Xichang space center at 1536 GMT (10:36 a.m. EST), according to the China Aerospace Science and Technology Corp., or CASC, China\u2019s biggest state-owned aerospace contractor.<\/p>\n

The Long March 3B pitched away from Xichang, located in Sichuan province in southwestern China, on an easterly trajectory to head for an elliptical geostationary transfer orbit.<\/p>\n

Liftoff occurred at 11:36 p.m. Beijing time.<\/p>\n

After dropping its four hydrazine-fueled boosters, first stage, and second stage, the Long March 3B\u2019s twin-engine cryogenic upper stage ignited two times to inject the rocket\u2019s payload into the proper orbit for deployment. Chinese government officials said the mission achieved its \u201cpredetermined orbit\u201d and was a \u201ccomplete success.\u201d<\/p>\n

U.S. military tracking data indicated the payload separated from the Long March 3B rocket in an elliptical, or egg-shaped, orbit ranging between 120 miles (194 kilometers) and 22,251 miles (35,811 kilometers) in altitude, with an inclination of 28.5 degrees to the equator.<\/p>\n

The spacecraft is expected to use an on-board propulsion system to reach a circular orbit more than 22,000 miles over the equator, where its orbital velocity will match Earth\u2019s rotation, giving the satellite a fixed coverage area.<\/p>\n

According to CASC, the new spacecraft \u2014 named TJS 6 \u2014 is a communication technology test satellite. The TJS 6 spacecraft will be \u201cmainly used for satellite communications, radio and television, data transmission, and other services,\u201d CASC said, along with conducting related technology verification tests.<\/p>\n

But independent analysts believe the TJS 6 satellite has a military purpose, and could carry sensors designed to warn Chinese leaders of an impending missile attack. Low-resolution illustrations of the TJS 6 satellite show payloads that are similar to infrared instruments on-board U.S. military early warning satellites.<\/p>\n

China has launched six satellites in the TJS series since 2015, and all are widely speculated to have military missions. The TJS 2, TJS 5, and TJS 6 satellites appear to be of the same type, likely with missile warning sensors.<\/p>\n

The TJS 1 and TJS 4 satellites are theorized to have an electronic or signals intelligence-gathering mission.<\/p>\n

Email the author.<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n

Follow Stephen Clark on Twitter: @StephenClark1.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A Long March 3B rocket takes off with the TJS 6 satellite. Credit: CASC A mysterious Chinese government satellite, believed to be a military-operated early warning station, successfully launched into orbit Feb. 4 on top of a Long March 3B rocket. The three-stage, 184-foot-tall (55-meter) rocket lifted off from the Xichang space center at 1536 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[1886,312,135,1887,25,205,1888,257],"class_list":["post-11878","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-calt","tag-casc","tag-china","tag-early-warning","tag-launch","tag-long-march","tag-long-march-3b","tag-military-space"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11878"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11878"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11878\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11878"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11878"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11878"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}