I have always been a fan of science fiction. This means that I have always been interested in space flight. Early on, man's moves into space were referred to as the Space Race. This highlighted the fact that there was an intertwining of national prestige, available funding, public appreciation, military capability, utility and the universal urge to explore new realms.
In March of 2013, a presentation was made on China's future in space to the People's Congress and the Communist Central Committee. The presentation included an optimistic plan for a permanent space station and exploration beyond the Earth.
The successful landing of the Jade Rabbit lunar rover on the Moon by China was the last mission of Phase II of the Chinese Lunar Exploration Program also known as the Chang'e program after a Chinese lunar goddess. There have been some technical problems with temperature changes and communications but the rover has been able to carry out some parts of its mission.
The first phase of the Chinese Lunar Explorations Program (A.K.A. the Chang'e program) consisted of two lunar orbiters, the Chang'e 1 and 2. These two orbiter were launched in 2007 and 2010. They generated highly detailed maps of the lunar surface in order to assist in the selection of a landing site for phase two.
The Chinese Lunar Exploration Program (A.K.A. the Chang'e program) is a Chinese space program that has utilized and will utilize lunar orbiters, lunar landers, lunar rovers and lunar sample returners to explore the Moon. Chang'e is a Chinese lunar goddess. Ouyang Ziyuan is the chief scientist of the program. He is one of the first Chinese scientists to advocate exploitation of lunar helium-3 for future nuclear fusion reactors.
The United States military utilizes low earth orbit satellites for guiding "smart" bombs, military communication networks and surveillance. The Chinese 2007 demonstration of the capability to destroy satellites in orbit showed that U.S. satellites were now vulnerable to destruction by countries which might be enemies in the future. The U.S. lodged a protest with the Chinese government over the test which destroyed an old Chinese weather satellite. The U.S.
China has been working on anti-satellite weapons systems (ASAT) since 1964. They have been developing three types of ASAT systems including Directed Energy, Micro-satellites and Direct Fire. There was an interruption of progress during the Cultural Revolution in the 1960s.
Today I am going to talk about recent Chinese satellite launches. In 2007 China launched two navigation satellite, an ocean survey satellite, a Nigerian communication satellite, two remote sensing satellites, two communication satellites, a Brazilian remote sensing satellite and a lunar orbiter.
Today I am going to start a series of posts about Chinese launch facilities. The first facility I am going to cover is the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center(JSLC). The JSLC is located about a thousand miles west of Beijing in the Gobi desert. It is over three thousand feet above sea level. The very dry location which has extended daylight hours.
I mentioned in a previous post that China has been building and launching satellites for other countries. This is not a unique practice since other countries have launched satellites for countries without their own space programs. However, in most cases, these other countries launch services have been aimed at making money. In China's case, there seems to be more to it.
