China launches another geostationary military satellite
Source: Spaceflight Now
Date Published: 08/25/2021
China launched another military satellite Tuesday aboard a Long March 3B rocket, just four hours after liftoff of a different launcher with multiple prototype spacecraft for a planned constellation of orbiting internet stations. The TJS 7 satellite launched at 1541 GMT (11:41 a.m. EDT) Tuesday from the Xichang space center, a spaceport nestled amid a hilly region of Sichuan province in southwestern China. The launch aboard a Long March 3B rocket, which occurred at 11:41 p.m. Beijing time, was the second Chinese space mission to ascend into orbit Tuesday. Earlier in the day, a Long March 2C rocket launched from the Jiuquan space center in northwestern China with a group of test satellites for a Chinese space-based broadband network. The TJS 7 satellite rode its 184-foot-tall (56-meter) Long March 3B launcher into an elongated geostationary transfer orbit with a perigee, or low point, of 122 miles (197 kilometers) and an apogee, or high point, of 22,255 miles (35,816 kilometers). The rocket’s cryogenic upper stage deployed the TJS 7 spacecraft into an orbit inclined 28.5 degrees
