China Launches Second Yaogan-50 Satellite Into Highly Retrograde Orbit
China conducted a pair of launches March 15 sending a second Yaogan-50 satellite into a highly retrograde orbit and completing a Kuaizhou-11 solid rocket rideshare mission.
The launches were the third and fourth since March 12 following a near month-long hiatus for Chinese New Year holidays and annual political sessions in Beijing.
A Long March 6A rocket lifted off at 822 a.m. Eastern March 15 from Taiyuan Satellite Launch Center in north China. The payload was Yaogan-50 (02) satellite joining the Yaogan-50 (01) satellite launched in January in a highly retrograde orbit.
The satellite entered a 701 by 944 kilometer altitude orbit with an inclination of 142 degrees a highly retrograde orbit before circularizing at 952 kilometers. Such launches incur a performance penalty as the launch vehicle must achieve orbital velocity without benefiting from Earths rotational speed.
The mid-latitude orbit sees Yaogan-50 satellites pass over China and surrounding areas with the retrograde orbit offering different groundtrack patterns for remote sensing than prograde or sun-synchronous orbits.
While Yaogan-50 (01) was developed by the Shanghai Academy of Spaceflight Technology the 02 satellite was developed by the China Academy of Space Technology another major CASC subsidiary.
Yaogan satellites are described by China in generic civilian terms for land surveys crop yield estimation and environmental prevention.
The Kuaizhou-11 rideshare mission deployed eight satellites.