Original title: China Aerospace starts a new journey
On January 28, the State Council Information Office held a press conference, and my country’s fifth aerospace white paper – “2021 China’s Aerospace” was officially released. This is the first edition of the white paper after my country has entered a new stage of development and embarked on a new journey to build a socialist modernized country in an all-round way, and has important practical significance.
Wu Yanhua, deputy director of the National Space Administration, said at the press conference that in the past five years, Chang’e has been chasing the moon, Beidou guides the way, Zhu Rong explores fire, Xihe Zuri, Tianhe roams the stars, “Wukong” and “Huiyan” explore the mysteries of the universe. Forge ahead, create new achievements, and achieve new leaps. According to statistics, from 2016 to 2021, my country carried out a total of 207 launches, and the launch success rate of the Long March launch vehicle was 96.7%. The upgrading of launch vehicles has been accelerated. A new generation of non-toxic and non-polluting launch vehicles represented by the Long March 5 has been put into use one after another. Commercial launch vehicles continue to emerge, forming diversified launch capabilities on land and sea. There are many highlights of major aerospace projects. The construction of the Chinese space station has been fully implemented, and six astronauts have been stationed successively, opening the era of long-term presence. The lunar exploration project of “circling, landing, and returning” came to a successful conclusion. “Chang’e 4” landed for the first time on the back of the moon for inspection and exploration, and “Chang’e 5” brought back 1731 grams of lunar soil. “Tianwen-1” realizes the leap of China’s spaceflight from the Earth-Moon system to interplanetary exploration, leaving China’s imprint on Mars for the first time. The space infrastructure has been continuously improved, the Beidou global satellite navigation system has been completed and put into operation, and the high-resolution Earth observation system has developed systematic capabilities. Aviation is capable of economic and social development. There are more than 500 satellites of various types in orbit, which widely serve economic and social development and play an important role in the construction of Safe China, Beautiful China, and Digital China. Communication satellites provide services such as distance education, telemedicine, and rural e-commerce for more than 140 million households in rural and remote areas, helping to fight poverty and revitalize rural areas. The Beidou system is widely used in mass travel, smart logistics, and precision agriculture, especially to provide precise positioning and navigation services for the prevention and control of the new crown pneumonia epidemic. Aerospace technology has promoted the development of a large number of emerging industries such as new energy and new materials, and promoted the rise of new formats such as smart cities and unmanned driving.
Wu Yanhua introduced that in the next five years, in terms of major projects, my country will build a Chinese space station and a high-resolution Earth observation system, implement new major projects such as the fourth phase of lunar exploration and planetary exploration, promote the development of heavy-duty launch vehicles, and build near-Earth small Planetary impact risk response system, cultivate key projects such as the exploration of the edge of the solar system, promote the development of the spectrum of launch vehicles, continue to improve the national space infrastructure, and improve the capacity of the space environment governance system.
Liu Jizhong, director of the Lunar Exploration and Aerospace Engineering Center of the National Space Administration, introduced that in the next five years, my country will continue to implement the lunar exploration project, launch the “Chang’e 6” probe, and complete the sampling return of the lunar polar region; launch the “Chang’e 7” probe, Complete the high-precision landing and shadow crater leap detection in the lunar polar region; complete the key technological breakthroughs for the “Chang’e 8” mission, and jointly carry out the construction of an international lunar scientific research station with relevant countries, international organizations and international partners. Continue to implement the planetary exploration project, launch asteroid probes, complete near-Earth asteroid sampling and main-belt comet detection, and complete key technological breakthroughs such as Mars sampling return and Jupiter galaxy detection. Demonstrate implementation plans such as the detection of the edge of the solar system.
According to reports, the fourth phase of the lunar exploration project has planned 4 missions. The first mission is the “Chang’e 4” that has been successfully implemented, and there are 3 follow-up missions, namely “Chang’e 6”, “Chang’e 7” and “Chang’e 7″. Chang’e 8”. Among them, “Chang’e 6” mainly returns to the high-value areas of the moon for sampling and return, and new lunar soil and new samples will be returned to the earth; “Chang’e 7” mainly conducts scientific exploration of the lunar polar regions, especially the lunar Water distribution detection; “Chang’e 8” will carry out scientific detection in polar regions and verify the follow-up key technologies for the scientific research station. (Reporter Feng Hua)