Countdown starts for Long March V launch

By Li Xinran  |   2008-7-3  |     NEWSPAPER EDITION

THE development of Long March V, the nation's next-generation space-launch vehicle, has begun.

The first rocket of the series is scheduled for launch by 2014, the China News Service reported yesterday. Significant progress has been made on the rocket engine and the building of a production plant.

The 120-ton liquid oxygen-kerosene engine for the rocket had passed initial tests, said Liang Xiaohong, vice president of the China Academy of Launch Vehicle Technology.

With four boosters, the 59.5-meter-high environmentally friendly rocket will be able to deliver a 25-ton payload to low-Earth orbit (LEO), compared with the present 10 tons, and a 14-ton payload to geosynchronous transfer orbit (GEO), compared with 5.5 tons now.

Its launching weight will be 643 tons, according to a report from China Central Television.

The rocket is 5 meters wide and cannot be transported via railway or expressway to any of China's present launch centers.

A production plant has been set up in coastal Tianjin City and the rockets will be transported by sea from there to a new launch facility at Wenchang on Hainan Island.

The 500,000-square-meter Tianjin plant has a total investment of 4.5 billion yuan (US$657 million) and the first phase of construction will be completed at the end of next year.

The Long March V would fulfill the requirement for large-payload LEO and GEO missions for the next 20 to 30 years, said Li Hong, president of the launch-vehicle academy.

The first rocket of the Long March family was launched on April 24, 1970, sending China's first satellite Dongfanghong-1 into the space.

Since then, the Long March rockets have carried out 107 missions.

Between April 1970 and October 1997, there were seven failures in 49 launches of the Long March rockets, according to a 1998 issue of Aerospace China magazine.

Since 1997, the success rate has been 100 percent.