Satellite News

State-owned space conglomerate China Aerospace Science and Technology Corp (CAST) is working with local authorities in Shandong province to set up a manufacturing complex for solid-propellant rockets, according to a project insider.

United Launch Alliance (ULA) plans to end operation of the Atlas V launch vehicle with the Russian RD-180 engine in the mid-2020s, Julie Arnold, an ULA spokeswoman, was quoted as saying.

Rocket: Chang Zheng 11H (Y2); Payload: nine Jilin-1 Gaofen 03-1 smallsats; Date: 15 September 2020, 0123 UTC; Launch site: De Bo 3 launch platform, Yellow Sea, China.

China’s optical remote-sensing satellite Jilin-1 Gaofen 02C was lost in a launch failure.

The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) has been pressing forward with the development of the H3 Launch Vehicle. In the process, a technical problem was identified regarding the LE-9 first-stage engine, which is a new engine now under development.

Reconstruction and modernisation of the Sea Launch space complex, currently based in Russia’s Far East, is expected to begin in November 2020, Roskosmos Director General Dmitry Rogozin said in a video posted on YouTube.

Gilmour Space Technologies said it has secured the first Australian customer for its maiden Eris rocket launch in 2022. Space Machines Company has contracted to launch a 35-kilogram spacecraft to orbit, the largest payload announced to date by an Australian space company.

The top management of Russia’s state space corporation Roskosmos, as well as industry experts and S7 officials, have assessed the readiness of the Sea Launch space complex for missions of the prospective Soyuz-5 and Soyuz-6 rockets, Roskosmos said in a statement.