China – Page 6 – Spaceflight Now

China launches ambitious mission to return lunar material to Earth

November 23, 2020 Stephen Clark

A heavy-lift Long March 5 rocket hurled a 9-ton Chinese spacecraft toward the moon Monday on a 23-day mission attempting to return lunar samples to Earth for the first time in 44 years.

Live coverage: Chinese sample return spacecraft completes docking in lunar orbit

November 23, 2020 Stephen Clark

After launching Nov. 23 and arriving in lunar orbit over the weekend, China’s Chang’e 5 sample return mission landed on the moon Tuesday, targeting a volcanic region in the Oceanus Procellarum region. On Thursday, the craft’s ascender vehicle took off to begin the trip back to Earth, followed by a successful docking with the mission’s return vehicle in lunar orbit Saturday.

China set to attempt first lunar sample return mission in four decades

November 22, 2020 Stephen Clark

Chinese scientists and engineers are counting down to launch of a heavy-lift Long March 5 rocket Monday with the Chang’e 5 mission, an ambitious attempt to land on the moon, drill samples from beneath the lunar surface, and return the material to Earth.

China launches mobile telecom satellite

November 14, 2020 Stephen Clark

A new Chinese mobile communications satellite launched Thursday on top of a Long March 3B rocket, joining a similar spacecraft launched four years ago to provide voice and data services to users on the go.

New Chinese rocket successful in debut launch

November 8, 2020 Stephen Clark

A new four-stage rocket operated by the Chinese launch company Galactic Energy succeeded on its inaugural flight Saturday, delivering a data relay microsatellite to an orbit 300 miles above Earth.

Ten Satellogic Earth-imaging satellites successfully launched

November 6, 2020 Stephen Clark

Ten small high-resolution observation satellites for Satellogic — an Argentine company in the midst of deploying a fleet of Earth-imaging spacecraft — successfully launched Friday on a Chinese Long March 6 rocket.

China launches three military spy satellites

October 26, 2020 Stephen Clark

Three mysterious payloads widely believed to be signals intelligence satellites for the Chinese military rocketed into orbit on top of a Long March 2C booster Monday from a launch base in southwestern China.

China launches geosynchronous Earth observation satellite

October 12, 2020 Stephen Clark

China successfully launched a Gaofen optical observation satellite Sunday toward a perch more than 22,000 miles over the equator, where it will use an Earth-facing telescope to collect remote sensing images, Chinese state media said.

China’s Mars-bound probe returns self-portrait from deep space

October 6, 2020 Stephen Clark

China’s space agency has released images captured by a small camera ejected from the country’s first Mars-bound spacecraft, showing the probe in deep space as it nears the halfway point of its seven-month journey from Earth to the Red Planet.

China launches environmental monitoring satellites

September 28, 2020 Stephen Clark

Without any public warning, a Chinese Long March 4B rocket lifted off Sunday with two “environmental monitoring satellites” that the country’s state media said will replace a pair of spacecraft launched in 2008 that collected data to assist in a series of disaster relief efforts over the last decade.