China's Space Program Thread II

[TheRathalos]

There's a weird SSO listing on spacetrack that may be related to Ceres-2, Jiuquan-launched Chinese object in 570km SSO

Separation failure? Late burn S4 failure (like the one in November, but slightly later)?
Or just misidentification.. but if it is one, why put it in 2026-012? Did they put the NROL launch in 011, despite it launching after Ceres? Or did they record the CZ-3B on some kind of orbit?
(for Reference, Alsat is listed in 009; Ceres-1 Tianqi should be 010)

 

[ENTED64]

There's a weird SSO listing on spacetrack that may be related to Ceres-2

Is it really the Ceres-2 launch that's responsible for this one? Maybe I'm reading into it too much but

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says "However, its flight became abnormal soon after liftoff, leading to a crash on the ground, according to footage taken by spectators." I don't have the original footage but that certainly sounds like it failed before it could get anything into orbit.

On the other hand the CZ-3B/E with the Shijian failed but it was the 3rd phase and as gpt pointed out there was a previous satellite which was carried on a rocket that had issues but was still able to get to its intended destination just with using its thrusters which cost it a lot of lifespan.

 

[TheRathalos]

Is it really the Ceres-2 launch that's responsible for this one? Maybe I'm reading into it too much but

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says "However, its flight became abnormal soon after liftoff, leading to a crash on the ground, according to footage taken by spectators." I don't have the original footage but that certainly sounds like it failed before it could get anything into orbit.

On the other hand the CZ-3B/E with the Shijian failed but it was the 3rd phase and as gpt pointed out there was a previous satellite which was carried on a rocket that had issues but was still able to get to its intended destination just with using its thrusters which cost it a lot of lifespan.

Yes most likely option is that they misidentified some other object as this, and they put the NROL launch before despite launching after.

 

[TheRathalos]

Jonathan mcdowell confirms that the TLE of the object the USSF tracked matches with a Jiuquan launch at 4:08 UTC.

Edit: TLE was deleted

 

[ZachL111]

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Interesting article, we have an updated timeline that Jack talks about, at least rumored before Feb 15th. I previously thought March like some others but this could be done potentially end of month or within early Feb, if we are lucky enough.

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We have confirmation that the 19th group of Guowang satellites will still be launched from Hainan on the 19th of January, from the Long March 12.