The Chinese Long March 4D rocket was able to set a national record for launching spacecraft during
What is known
As part of one mission, Long March 4D brought toorbit simultaneously 41 Gaofen 06A satellites. These are new spacecraft that will allow China to obtain high-resolution images of our planet's surface.
All satellites became part of the Jilin-1 grouping,which started in 2015. Now it consists of 108 spacecraft, each of which can take pictures of the Earth's surface with a resolution of 0.5-0.75 meters from a height of 500 km. Over the next six months, China will launch 30 more satellites into orbit.
138 spacecraft will be enough forobtaining repeated photographs of any point on the Earth with an interval of 10 minutes. However, China does not intend to stop there. By 2025, the Jilin-1 constellation will consist of more than 300 satellites. This amount is enough to update the image of the entire surface of the planet every day.
Chinese specialists spent less than a year ondevelopment of Gaofen 06A. Modern versions of the satellites weigh about 22 kg and cost approximately $560,000. The UN made early decisions after the earthquakes in Syria and Turkey based on data from the Gaofen 06A satellites.