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Flying without astronauts on a demonstration flight into Earth orbit, a test model of a next-generation Chinese crew capsule took off Tuesday on a Long March 5B long-haul rocket, the same launcher configuration that will lift segments of China’s planned space station.
The 176-foot (53.7-meter) Long March 5B rocket ignited its 10 main engines and flew into space at approximately 1000 GMT (6 amEDT; 6 pm Beijing time) from the Wenchang Satellite Launch Center on the island of Hainan in southern China.
A live webcast produced by China’s state CCTV television network showed the rocket’s final countdown and its launch from the Wenchang spaceport. Wenchang is China’s newest launch site, allowing vehicles to fly low over the South China Sea, rather than dropping stages ashore, as is the case during missions from launch bases. from mainland China.
The launch video showed the Long March 5B arching southeast from Wenchang into a clear sky later.
The Long March 5B’s two hydrogen powered YF-77 center stage engines and eight kerosene combustion boost engines, with two engines mounted on four strap-on boost modules, powered the launch vehicle of more than 900 tonnes with nearly 2.4 million pounds of thrust.
The rocket fired its four thrusters around three minutes into the flight, and the central stage of the Long March 5B was scheduled to fire for about eight minutes before deploying the capsule of China’s prototype crew into orbit.
China Aerospace Science and Technology Corp., or CASC, confirmed that on March 5, it placed the capsule’s payload in its “predetermined orbit” minutes after taking off from Wenchang.
The Long March 5B rocket is a new version of the Long March 5 launcher, the most powerful rocket in China. Designed to lift massive loads in low Earth orbit, the Long March 5B rocket flies without a second stage, and is slightly shorter than the Long March 5 full-size configuration.
The launcher’s lifting capacity to low Earth orbit is around 55,000 pounds, or 25 metric tons, according to Chinese state media. The Long March 5B version, which uses a “stage and a half” launch architecture, is designed to launch large modules for China’s planned space station.
Tuesday’s Long March 5B rocket launch also featured a new large payload fairing that is more than 67 feet (20.5 meters) long and 17 feet (5.2 meters) in diameter. The payload launched inside the new Long March 5B nose cover is a demonstration vehicle for China’s next-generation crew capsule, designed to eventually replace the country’s Shenzhou spacecraft to transport astronauts to a space station in the earth orbit.
The new capsule design is more capable than Shenzhou, according to Chinese officials. It will be able to carry astronauts to the moon, and can accommodate up to six crew members at a time, more than the three astronauts who can fly in Shenzhou, Chinese officials said.
In a different configuration, the crew capsule could be launched and landed with three astronauts, plus up to 1,100 pounds (500 kilograms) of cargo, according to China’s state news agency Xinhua. The capacity will allow China to return research specimens and hardware from the country’s space station to Earth.
The short-duration orbital test flight this week is expected to conclude with a re-entry and landing in remote northwest China, perhaps as early as Wednesday. Few details about the test flight have been released by the Chinese government.
The Shenzhou crew ship can only return a limited amount of cargo, and China’s Tianzhou supply ship for the country’s planned space station is not designed to return any cargo to Earth.
China’s next-generation aircraft carrier is also reusable for up to 10 flights, with a detachable heat shield built to handle returns to higher temperatures through Earth’s atmosphere, like those a capsule would encounter on a mission reentry lunar.
The Xinhua News Agency reported that the main objective of the crew capsule test flight is to verify the ship’s re-entry technologies, such as its heat shield and recovery system. The capsule will return under the parachute and inflate the air bags to cushion your landing on dry land.
Shenzhou’s lander also returns under a parachute, but uses rocket thrusters to soften the landing hit. That makes it a tougher ride for passengers.
With its propulsion and power module, the crew’s spacecraft is nearly 29 feet (8.8 meters) long. It will weigh around 47,600 pounds (21.6 metric tons) fully loaded with equipment and propellant, according to the China Manned Space Engineering Office, or CMSEO.
Chinese officials said earlier this year that the crew capsule on the March 5 long test flight will be loaded with 10 metric tons (22,000 pounds) of propeller, allowing for extensive maneuvers in orbit. The fuel load will also match the weight of the spacecraft with the expected launch weight of the Tianhe core module for the China space station, which is slated to complete in 2022.
China launched a small-scale crew module on a pilotless test flight in 2016.
Teams at the Wenchang launch base prepared the Long March 5B rocket and prototype crew capsule for flight amid the coronavirus pandemic. Chinese state media said managers reduced staffing levels at the spaceport and introduced telecommuting capabilities to allow some team members to participate in data reviews and meetings remotely.
China has conducted six space missions with astronauts since 2003. The most recent Shenzhou mission ended in November 2016 after a 32-day flight to the Chinese Tiangong 2 space laboratory with a two-man crew.
Plans to launch China’s first Mars rover later this year could hinge on the success of the March 5 launch of this week’s 5B. A Long March 5 rocket, in its previous configuration with a higher stage, is slated to launch the Mars robotic mission in July.
Chinese officials announced last month that the mission to Mars will be called Tianwen 1. Tianwen, or Questions to Heaven, is a poem written by ancient Chinese poet Qu Yuan. The China National Space Administration, China’s space agency, said that all future planetary exploration missions in the country will be called the Tianwen series.
Another Long March 5 rocket is slated to transport China’s robotic lunar mission Chang’e 5 into space later this year. Chang’e 5 will attempt to retrieve samples from the moon’s surface and return them to Earth.
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