Conference turris::scandia

522.0. "Freja satellite" by TLE::SAVAGE () Wed Oct 07 1992 12:37

   From: [email protected] (UPI)
   Newsgroups: clari.tw.misc,clari.biz.economy.world,clari.news.europe
   Subject: Chinese rocket launches Swedish satellite
   Date: Tue, 6 Oct 92 8:09:14 PDT
 
	BEIJING (UPI) -- A Chinese rocket blasted off from a western China
launch site Tuesday and successfully placed small Swedish and Chinese
research satellites in orbit, furthering China's low-cost commercial
launch program, officials said.
	The launch is the latest in China's commercial space program, which
has already launched a research satellite for Pakistan and put up
communications satellites for a Hong Kong consortium and an Australian
telecommunications company.
	The Chinese have been using relatively simple rockets to provide low-
cost launch services for foreign contractors, trying to earn a solid
share of the commercial launch business.
	The Long March 2C rocket lifted off from the Jiuquan launching site
in west China's Gansu province at 2:20 p.m. Tuesday. Swedish officials
said the launch was originally scheduled for Monday but was postponed
for a day for technical reasons.
	"We have made a very successful launch -- everything went as
predicted," said Klas Anggard, executive vice president of the Swedish
Space Corporation, which contracted with China to launch the "Freja"
research satellite.
	"After 10 minutes the satellite was delivered into the low orbit it
was supposed to be in, and we are already receiving data from it," said
Anggard, who was in Beijing.
	The official Xinhua news agency reported the same rocket also carried
a Chinese recoverable scientific survey satellite, and that tracking
stations had reported both satellites "have entered their designed
orbits."
	Officials said they were receiving only reports relayed from Jiuquan.
There was no live television broadcast and communications from Beijing
were spotty with the remote desert launching site, which Chinese space
officials use to launch research and military satellites.
	The Swedish Freja program, with a total budget of about $30 million,
will use the 570-pound satellite to conduct research on the upper
atmosphere and near space, including studying electromagnetic fields,
space particles and the so-called "Northern Lights."
	The Chinese satellite was to conduct experiments in scientific survey
and microgravity and return to Earth in eight days, the Xinhua report
said.
	The Freja satellite is to hold a low-Earth orbit with altitudes
ranging between 370 miles and 1,060 miles and beam measurements back to
ground stations.
	Along with several Swedish institutes, among the participants in the
experiments aboard are Johns Hopkins University in the United States,
Canada's University of Calgary and Germany's Max Planck Institute.