Ambitious Space Effort Challenges China In Next Five Years

DRAGON SPACE

Ambitious Space Effort Challenges China In Next Five Years
New Launchers And More Spacecraft Liftoffs

A collection of models showing past and future Chinese rocket designs - photo copyright AFP

by Wei Long
Beijing - Sept. 18, 2001
In addition to the list of science and application satellites that CASC intends to develop and build, the "10 5" period would also see launches of a Space Solar Telescope, a constellation of microsats designed specifically to monitor disasters, a twin satellite to study Earth's magnetosphere, development of a new generation of launchers, and several flights of the Shenzhou manned spacecraft.

The $2 billion renminbi (US$241.6 million) Space Solar Telescope recently received approval for launch during this period, according to a report in Beijing Morning Post on Sept. 9. The 1-meter aperture telescope, targeted for launch in 2005 to a polar sunsynchronous orbit, will monitor and study phenomena on our daytime star.

To help provide continuous monitoring of the environment and mitigate disasters, China's space agency China National Space Administration (CNSA) plans to launch a dedicated constellation of four optical and four synthetic aperture radar (SAR) microsats to carry out round-the-clock and all-weather surveillance.

During the "10 5" period, two optical and one SAR satellites will be launched. These microsats will have an average repeat visit every 32 hours.

With the expanded space program and more launches in the coming years, design and development began on a new generation of larger and higher capacity Changzheng (Long March) launchers. The goal is to produce non-toxic, non-polluting, and low-cost rockets with high performance and reliability.

International Collaboration
Some of the new Chinese space projects will involve international collaboration. China will partner with the European Space Agency (ESA) to study and gain a better understanding of the magnetic shield of our planet, the magnetosphere.

In the Double Star Project (DSP) a pair of spacecraft, with one in a polar orbit and the other in an equatorial orbit, will make observations of the magnetosphere with a suite of instruments. ESA will provide 10 instruments that are identical to the ones on its successful Cluster mission while Chinese science institutions will provide the remaining 8 instruments.

Two Changzheng-2C (LM-2C) rockets would launch the spacecraft in Dec. 2002 and Mar. 2003 into their respective highly elliptical orbits.

The collaboration hopes that DSP will be able to carry out an observing program in tandem with Cluster to obtain complementary data.

China has also expressed interest to cooperate with its northern neighbour Russia. Assistant Director-General of Rosaviakosmos, the Russian Aviation and Space Agency, Georgy Polishchuk told the Russian news agency ITAR-TASS on Sept. 13 that his organization would consider "the possibility of future mutually profitable cooperation in the field of space communications and navigation."

Polishchuk added that "Russian and Chinese aerospace enterprises have made 'definite progress in the field of piloted cosmonautics' ". However, he did not elaborate on the subject in the interview.

China had announced on several occasions that it would conduct at least three more unmanned test flights of the Shenzhou ("Magic Vessel" or "Divine Vessel") manned spacecraft before its yuhangyuans ("astronauts") are launched into space.

This would place the first manned Shenzhou launch on SZ-6 in the second half of 2002 at the earliest.

Chinese space officials have explained repeatedly that until the Shenzhou spacecraft and its CZ-2F (LM-2F) launcher achieve a very high degree of reliability and safety, no yuhangyuans would be launched to orbit.

Part One - Two

DRAGON SPACE

China Plans Six MetSats By 2008

Beijing - Sept. 5, 2001
China plans to mount an ambitious effort to launch six additional Fengyun weather satellites over the next six years.

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