China’s Long March 3B rocket launches new weather satellite
China early this morning successfully placed a weather satellite into orbit using its Long March 3B rocket.
No word on where the first stage crashed, though we know because the launch was from an interior launch site that it had to have crashed somewhere within China, hopefully not on any village anywhere.
The leaders in the 2021 launch race:
16 SpaceX
15 China
8 Russia
2 Rocket Lab
2 ULA
The U.S. still leads China 22 to 15 in the national rankings.
This list should change in only a few hours, as SpaceX has a Falcon 9 launch scheduled for 1:29 pm (Eastern), carrying a Dragon cargo freighter to ISS.
China early this morning successfully placed a weather satellite into orbit using its Long March 3B rocket.
No word on where the first stage crashed, though we know because the launch was from an interior launch site that it had to have crashed somewhere within China, hopefully not on any village anywhere.
The leaders in the 2021 launch race:
16 SpaceX
15 China
8 Russia
2 Rocket Lab
2 ULA
The U.S. still leads China 22 to 15 in the national rankings.
This list should change in only a few hours, as SpaceX has a Falcon 9 launch scheduled for 1:29 pm (Eastern), carrying a Dragon cargo freighter to ISS.