22 September 2020
After Reuters reported on 21 September that a space tracking facility located in Western Australia and owned by the Swedish Space Corporation (SSC) is to cut China's access to the facility when their current contract expires, Chinese space insiders said one day later there is at least a decade left on the contract, and the facility has not been used or visited by relevant working personnel from China for many years.
MORE...

25 September 2020
The Chang'e-4 lunar lander touched down on the far side of the Moon on 3 January 2019, with a German instrument for measuring space radiation on board. Since then, the Lunar Lander Neutron and Dosimetry (LND) instrument has been measuring temporally resolved cosmic radiation for the first time. Earlier devices could only record the entire 'mission dose'. In its current issue, the scientific journal Science Advances reports on the work of the international group of scientists involved with the LND, including researchers from the German Aerospace Center (Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt; DLR). Their investigations have involved more precise radiation measurements on the Moon.
MORE...
Article in Science Advances: "First measurements of the radiation dose on the lunar surface"

27 September 2020
China has successfully launched two environmental monitoring satellites from the Taiyuan Satellite Launch Centre in northern Shanxi Province on 27 September. A Long March-4B rocket carrying the HJ-2A and HJ-2B satellites took off at 11:23 BJT, according to the launch centre.
They will replace the HJ-1A and HJ-1B, the previous generation of environmental monitoring satellites, to provide services concerning environmental protection, natural resources, water conservancy, agriculture and forestry, according to CAST - the satellite developer.
MORE...

24 September 2020
Space-tracking ship Yuanwang 5 has departed from its port in east China's Jiangsu Province on 24 September for a maritime monitoring mission in the Pacific Ocean. This is the 3rd voyage of the ship this year. It will spend more than 100 days at sea and is scheduled to return in early 2021.
MORE...