Three different rockets – one each from Russia, China and Japan – launched satellites into orbit over three days in back-to-back-to-back space missions.
The launch triple play occurred between Thursday (Feb. 1) and Saturday (Feb. 3), and came one day after the U.S.-based company SpaceX launched a Falcon 9 rocket carrying the GovSat-1 communications satellite into orbit from the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida.
A Russian Soyuz 2 rocket launches two Kanopus-V Earth observation satellites, and nine other smaller satellites, into orbit from the Vostochny Cosmodrome on Feb. 1, 2018.
Credit: Roscosmos (Russian Federal Space Agency)
Russia kicked off the international rocket rally Thursday with the launch of a Soyuz 2 rocket from its Vostochny Cosmodrome. The Soyuz 2 carried two Kanopus-V Earth observation satellites into orbit to monitor the planet from space. The mission also delivered 9 smaller satellites into orbit, according to the Russian space agency Roscosmos .
A Chinese Long March 2D rocket launches the Zhangheng 1 earthquake signal detecting mission from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center on Feb. 2, 2018.
Credit: China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation
Up next was China, which launched a Long March 2D rocket on Friday from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center. That rocket carried the Zhangheng 1 satellite, which is designed to detect signals that might precede earthquakes from space to help earthquake prediction efforts. The mission, also known as the China Seismo-Electromagnetic Satellite, is a joint project by the China National Space Administration and the Italian Space Agency, according to Spaceflight Now .
The Long March 2D also carried six other satellites into orbit. According to Spaceflight Now , they include: the European cubesats GomX-4A (which will track ship and plane movements in the Arctic for the Danish Ministry of Defence) and the European Space Agency’s experimental GomX-4B; ÑuSat 4 and ÑuSat 5 microsatellites built for the company Satellogic in Argentina to monitor Earth; and two Chinese cubesats called FMN 1 and Shaonian Xing.
That brings us to Saturday, where the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) launched a modified SS-520 sounding rocket from the agency’s Uchinoura Space Center. The rocket carried the tiny satellite TRICOM-1R, nicknamed “Tsuki” into orbit.
TRICOM-1R is a cubesat designed to take photographs of Earth and beam observations back to Earth. It’s launch comes just over a year after JAXA’s first attempt to launch a small satellite on an modified SS520 sounding rocket failed. The satellite TRICOM-1 was lost in that Jan. 15, 2017 launch failure .
The Japanese Aerospace Exploration Agency successfully launched a modified SS-520 sounding rocket carrying the TRICOM-1R cubesat from the Uchinoura Space Center in Japan on Feb. 3, 2018.
Credit: JAXA
Whew, what a week! The year 2018 is certainly off to a fast start with more launches to come over the next 11 months.
Email Tariq Malik at tmalik@space.com or follow him @tariqjmalik and Google+. Follow us @Spacedotcom , Facebook and Google+ . Original article on Space.com .
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