Tag: China
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China launches data relay satellite for future space station crews
A Long March 3C/G2 rocket lifted off with the fourth Tianlian 1 data relay satellite Tuesday. Credit: Xinhua China added a fourth craft Tuesday to a network of geostationary data relay satellites tasked with keeping mission control in steady contact with Shenzhou crew capsules and a planned space station. The new satellite is the fourth…
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Two Chinese astronauts back on Earth
China’s spacecraft recovery team works around the Shenzhou 11 landing capsule Friday after its touchdown in Inner Mongolia. Credit: Xinhua Two Chinese astronauts closed out a month in space Friday with a parachute-assisted landing in northern China’s remote Inner Mongolia territory, a day after the crew departed the Tiangong 2 space lab to begin the…
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Mysterious weather satellite launched from China
A Long March 2D rocket lifted off at 2314 GMT (6:14 p.m. EST) Friday with the Yunhai 1 weather satellite. Credit: Xinhua China launched a polar-orbiting weather satellite Friday to take data on the atmosphere and seas, state media announced, but Chinese officials offered little detail on the craft’s mission. The Yunhai 1 satellite lifted…
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China lofts pulsar navigation demo satellite
A Long March 11 rocket blasts off from the Jiuquan space center at 2342 GMT (6:42 p.m. EST) Wednesday. Credit: CCTV China launched an innovative satellite Wednesday that will look for X-ray signals from pulsars, the fast-spinning super-dense remnants of collapsed stars, to determine its exact location in space. The experimental pulsar navigation mission carries…
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Video: Long March 5 rocket lifts off on maiden flight
China debuted its new Long March 5 rocket Thursday with a successful nighttime blastoff on top of 2.4 million pounds of ground-shaking thrust from the country’s new Hainan Island spaceport. Powered by 10 engines, the 187-foot-tall (57-meter) rocket took off at 1243 GMT (8:43 a.m. EDT; 8:43 p.m. Beijing time) and sent an experimental satellite…
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China launches Long March 5, one of the world’s most powerful rockets
The Long March 5 rocket takes off at 1243 GMT (8:43 a.m. EDT) on Thursday. Credit: Xinhua China’s heavy-lift Long March 5 rocket fired into space on a successful inaugural flight Thursday, debuting a brand new launcher that can carry twice the payload of any other Chinese booster and setting a keystone for the country’s…
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Long March 5 heavy-lifter ready to join China’s rocket inventory
China is ready to debut a heavy-lifting rocket rivaling the biggest boosters in the world Thursday, paving the way for a backlog of missions to loft massive space station modules, send deep space probes to the moon and Mars, and perhaps deploy commercial satellites. The Long March 5 rocket is bigger than anything else in…
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Chinese astronauts halfway through country’s longest space mission
The Banxing 2 satellite deployed from Tiangong 2 captured this view of the mini-space station from above. Credit: Xinhua/China Academy of Sciences/China Manned Space Engineering Office Two Chinese astronauts are busy with medical experiments and other duties as they near the halfway mark of a month-long stay aboard the Tiangong 2 space lab, according to…
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Chinese space lab deploys compact satellite for external surveys
This view of the Tiangong 2 and Shenzhou 11 docked complex was recorded Sunday and downlinked to Earth on Tuesday by the Banxing 2 micro-satellite. Credit: CCTV A companion satellite ejected from China’s orbiting Tiangong 2 research module has snapped unique views of the space lab as two astronauts inside press on with experiments and…
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China snaps selfies of its space lab
A “selfie” from China’s Banxing 2 inspection satellite shows the Shenzhou 11 spaceship docked to the Tiangong 2 orbital lab. (Credit: CAS via CCTV) China’s Tiangong 2 space lab has a paparazzi traveling alongside it, in the form of a picture-snapping satellite that’s the size of a desktop printer. The satellite, Banxing 2, was released from…