Tag: CSS

China successfully launches 1st cargo freighter to its space station

9:31 am

On May 29th China successfully launched the first Tianzhou cargo freighter to bring cargo the now-orbiting first module, Tianhe, of its under construction space station, docking there one day later.

They plan to launch the first crew of three to the station in June.
The leaders in the 2021 launch race:

16 SpaceX
14 China
8 Russia
2 Rocket Lab
2 ULA

The U.S still leads China 22 to 14 in the national rankings.

Sorry for the late posting, but I have been off on a cave expedition in a very remote area in Nevada. Needed a break from the news and work. Presently on the long drive home. Posting will resume at full speed later tonight.

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China scrubs launch of station cargo freighter again

10:43 am

For the second time in two days China has scrubbed the launch of the first unmanned Tianzhou cargo freighter to the core module of its space station,

As before, the Chinese only said that the scrub was due to unstated “technical issues.”

They will likely try again tomorrow, but that is pure speculation. Without a more detailed report from China, we really have no idea what is happening.

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China scrubs launch of Tianzhou freighter to its Tianhe station module

12:24 pm

The first launch of a Tianzhou freighter to China’s first module, dubbed Tianhe, of its planned Chinese Space Station (CSS), was scrubbed early this morning for unstated “technical reasons.”

Not only has China’s state-run press or its space agency not revealed what caused the scrub, they have said nothing about a new launch date. This cargo freighter however apparently needs to be in place before the arrival of the station’s first crew, now roughly scheduled for sometime in June.

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China rolls out rocket for next space station launch

10:00 am

The new colonial movement: On May 15th China rolled out the Long March 7 rocket that on May 20th will carry the first Tianzhou cargo freighter to the already launched core module of its space station.

Tianzhou-2 will carry 4.69 tons of cargo in a pressurized segment and 1.95 tons of propellant, according to the China Manned Space Agency (CMSA).

Meanwhile, the core stage, dubbed Tianhe, has successfully completed its on-orbit checkouts and has placed itself in the right orbit for the arrival of Tianzhou.

If all goes right with this cargo mission, China is targeting a June launch for the station’s first three-man crew, who will attempt to stay at the station for three months.

Do not expect much information to be released by China during these missions. Like the Soviet Union of old, and as they have been doing routinely since their space program began to gear up in the past decade, they will only make periodic terse announcements, all of which will contain only the most superficial of information. Only much later will more be learned, usually many years after the fact when its news value has vanished and it only concerns historians and space buffs.

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China’s 21-ton Long March 5B core stage to make uncontrolled re-entry

9:33 pm

For the second time in two launches, the 21-ton core stage of China’s Long March 5B rocket is about to make uncontrolled re-entry, with a mass large enough that some part of it is certain to hit the ground.

Where and when the new Long March 5B stage will land is impossible to predict. The decay of its orbit will increase as atmospheric drag brings it down into more denser. The speed of this process depends on the size and density of the object and variables include atmospheric variations and fluctuations, which are themselves influenced by solar activity and other factors.

The high speed of the rocket body means it orbits the Earth roughly every 90 minutes and so a change of just a few minutes in reentry time results in reentry point thousands of kilometers away.

The Long March 5B core stage’s orbital inclination of 41.5 degrees means the rocket body passes a little farther north than New York, Madrid and Beijing and as far south as southern Chile and Wellington, New Zealand, and could make its reentry at any point within this area.

The previous core stage hit the Atlantic Ocean six days after launch in May 2020. Had it come down fifteen to thirty minutes earlier it would have come down on U.S. soil, possibly even on top of the New York metropolitan area.

China’s design for this rocket means that every single launch will result in similar potential disasters. They cannot restart the core stage’s engines after cut-off, so that once it has delivered its payload it is nothing more than a very big and uncontrolled brick that has to hit the ground somewhere.

This is a direct violation of the Outer Space Treaty, which China is a signatory. The treaty makes signatories liable for any damage from an uncontrolled re-entry, and requires them to take action to prevent such events from occurring.

China it appears doesn’t care much about the treaties it signs. The first time could be rung up to a mistake. The second time is intentional and tells us that this country will not honor any of its obligations anywhere else, if it decides it can get away with it.

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SpaceX launches 60 more Starlink satellites; China launches Tianhe station module

10:16 pm

Twas a busy evening. SpaceX successfully put 60 more Starlink satellites into orbit using its Falcon 9 rocket, with the first stage successfully completing its seventh flight, landing safely on the drone ship in the Atlantic.

China in turn successfully used its Long March 5B rocket to place in orbit the core module, dubbed Tianhe, of its planned space station. This is the first of eleven launches in the next two years to assemble the station’s initial configuration, including cargo and manned missions along the way.

The SpaceX live stream is at the link. I have embedded China’s English language live stream of the Tianhe launch below the fold. The launch is about 52 minutes in.

The leaders in the 2021 launch race:

12 SpaceX
10 China
7 Russia
2 Rocket Lab

The U.S. still leads China 17 to 10 in the national rankings.
» Read more

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