Chinese Space Tracking Fleet Continues Rehearsal

DRAGON SPACE

Tracking Fleet Continues Rehearsal

one of four ships making up China's fleeting of tracking ships

by Wei Long
Tokyo - Feb 20, 2002
China's fleet of four space tracking vessels continued their rehearsal for the next Shenzhou launch despite ongoing delays with what will be the third test launch of China's future manned spacecraft. Report of the exercise activities appeared in the People's Liberation Army Daily Feb 10.

The Yuanwang fleet (Yuanwang means "Long View") continued to rehearse up until days before the arrival of the Lunar New Year of the Horse a week ago. PLA Daily reported that the fleet successfully completed testings of several domestically developed systems in recent days, and the tracking vessels were ready to perform space mission tracking tasks.

In order to meet the requirement of increasing tracking and commanding capabilities at sea, in the past few years the fleet has focused on networking research to support tracking and commanding, navigation, power, and equipment protection.

One of the systems that the fleet has developed is the navigation command system network, which is equipped with an advanced electronic ocean map system.

The system displays realtime navigation conditions of the tracking vessels, thus solving the difficulties of exchanging realtime information between the vessels and the base of the tracking fleet and the command centre.

Another key development is the three oceans meteorological safeguard network simulation training system. The new system changes the training model of meteorological protection from the previous self-protection of an individual vessel to joint protection of multiple vessels.

As the nationwide celebration of the Lunar New Year is nearing an end, launch preparation activities of Shenzhou-3 may resume shortly. It is not clear what impact, if any, the long hiatus of the Shenzhou test flight will have on other launches that China has planned to carry out this year.

A month ago Director of Shanghai Academy of Spaceflight Technology (SAST, formerly known as the Shanghai Bureau of Astronautics) Yuan Jie said that 2002 would be the busiest year in the history of the Chinese space program with 10 launchers planned before year end.

DRAGON SPACE

Young Helmsmen At Shenzhou Mission Control

Beijing - Jan 29, 2002
Signs of launch preparations for Shenzhou-3 at the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center (JSLC) continue to emerge with mission controllers at the Beijing Aerospace Command and Control Center (BACCC) said to be working around the clock to get ready to track the unmanned test flight.

Thanks for being here; We need your help. The SpaceDaily news network continues to grow but revenues have never been harder to maintain. With the rise of Ad Blockers, and Facebook - our traditional revenue sources via quality network advertising continues to decline. And unlike so many other news sites, we don't have a paywall - with those annoying usernames and passwords. Our news coverage takes time and effort to publish 365 days a year. If you find our news sites informative and useful then please consider becoming a regular supporter or for now make a one off contribution.
SpaceDaily Contributor $5 Billed Once credit card or paypal		SpaceDaily Monthly Supporter $5 Billed Monthly paypal only

The content herein, unless otherwise known to be public domain, are Copyright 1995-2016 - Space Media Network. All websites are published in Australia and are solely subject to Australian law and governed by Fair Use principals for news reporting and research purposes. AFP, UPI and IANS news wire stories are copyright Agence France-Presse, United Press International and Indo-Asia News Service. ESA news reports are copyright European Space Agency. All NASA sourced material is public domain. Additional copyrights may apply in whole or part to other bona fide parties. Advertising does not imply endorsement, agreement or approval of any opinions, statements or information provided by Space Media Network on any Web page published or hosted by Space Media Network. Privacy Statement All images and articles appearing on Space Media Network have been edited or digitally altered in some way. Any requests to remove copyright material will be acted upon in a timely and appropriate manner. Any attempt to extort money from Space Media Network will be ignored and reported to Australian Law Enforcement Agencies as a potential case of financial fraud involving the use of a telephonic carriage device or postal service.