29 October 2020
Chinese space engineers have begun to test technologies that they hope will help to make their carrier rockets smarter. CASC's engineers will upgrade computers and control systems on rockets to enable them to monitor flight conditions and recalculate and correct their flight if necessary. In addition, researchers at the academy's Beijing Aerospace Automatic Control Institute are trying to give the rockets learning capabilities. The attempt, if successful, will allow rockets to proactively adapt to sophisticated environments and emergencies so as to ensure the better completion of tasks.
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29 October 2020
China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation, the manufacturer of 17 first- and second-generation Fengyun satellites, will develop 7 new meteorological satellites during the country's 14th Five-Year Plan period (2021-2025), Yang Baohua, Deputy Manager of the company, said on 28 October at the 2020 Fengyun Satellite User Conference in Suzhou, east China's Jiangsu Province.
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28 October 2020
Blaine Curcio and Jean Deville report on the webportal SpaceWatchGlobal about the 6th CCAF - China Commercial Aerospace Forum. The info from the event was primarily two types: 1) a huge data dump by all of CASIC’s space project subsidiaries, including informative speeches by Xingyun and Hongyun, and local media interviews with both in addition to Expace, and 2) lots of updates from commercial companies.
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26 October 2020
China successfully sent a group of new remote-sensing satellites into orbit from the Xichang Satellite Launch Center in southwest China's Sichuan Province late in the evening on the 26 October. Belonging to the Yaogan-30 family, the satellites were launched by a Long March-2C carrier rocket at 23:19 Beijing Time. The satellites have entered the planned orbits and will be used for electromagnetic environment detection and related technological tests. Also on board the rocket was the Tianqi-6 satellite belonging to the Tianqi constellation.
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27 October 2020
The BBC published a story by Kavita Puri about the Chinese scientist who helped not one but two superpowers to reach the Moon but his story is remembered in only one of them.
link to the BBC article ...
link to the BBC podcast...

24 October 2020
The Chang'e 4 lander and the Yutu 2 rover have been switched to dormant mode for the 23rd lunar night after working stably for the 23rd lunar day, according to CNSA's Lunar Exploration and Space Programme Centre. The lander was switched to dormant mode on 23 October at 21:40 h BJT as scheduled, and the rover, at 12:00 h BJT the same day, said the centre. As of 24 October, the Chang'e 4 lunar probe had been on the far side of the Moon for 660 Earth days and the rover has travelled 565.9 m.
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