China’s NewGen rocket launches 22 satellites

Beijing: China’s new Long March-8 rocket placed 22 satellites in space on Sunday, setting a domestic record for the most spacecraft launched by a single rocket. The rocket blasted off at 11:06 a.m. (Beijing Time) at the Wenchang Spacecraft Launch Site in the southern Hainan Province before sending the satellites into pre-set orbits, state-run Xinhua news agency reported.

These satellites will be mainly used for commercial remote sensing services, marine environment monitoring, forest fire prevention and disaster mitigation. The mission marked the 409th flight of the Long March carrier rockets. The Long March-8 used for Sunday’s launch is a modified version of the medium-lift carrier rocket and is 48 meters long with a take-off weight of 198 tonnes. It uses non-toxic and pollution-free propellants with a 3-tonne capacity for sun-synchronous orbit, the Xinhua report said. Compared with the original model, the modified model does not have side boosters but can launch multiple satellites with different orbital requirements.

The Long March-8 is the new generation of China’s carrier rocket. Designed and built by the China Academy of Launch Vehicle Technology, the rocket fills a gap in China’s launch capability to the sun-synchronous orbit and meets the needs of more than 80 per cent of launch missions for medium and low-orbit spacecraft. Xiao Yun, chief commander of the rocket, said an assembly and test plant for the Long March-8 family is being built outside the Wenchang launch site.

Once completed, it is expected to shorten the launch interval of the Long March-8 rocket to seven days, enabling 50 launches a year. On February 10, China unveiled an ambitious plan for its burgeoning space industry this year which included over 50 space launches and six manned space flights to complete the building of its space station. The China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation (CASC) said China will carry out more than 50 space launches in 2022, sending over 140 spacecraft into space,

“The year 2022 will see China’s projects in space at the top of its game,” Ma Tao, the deputy chief of the space department at China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation (CASC) said. Among the many tasks planned for 2022, Ma noted that six launches will be dedicated to China’s manned space project to build space station, which is expected to be completed this year.

“We will complete the rendezvous and docking of the two lad modules with the core module under manned condition to complete the T-shaped design for the space station,” Bai Linhou, the deputy chief designer of space station system at CASC, state-run CGTN reported. —PTI