Happenings with the Chinese Space Station

Posted on by onespaceman2000
Image (Credit): The successful launch of three astronauts to the Tiangong space station via China’s Long March 2F rocket on April 24. 2025. (Andy Wong/AP)

The Chinese space program continues to operate and advance as NASA faces daunting cuts and general disorientation under the Department of Government Efficiency (a misnomer if there ever was one).

On April 24, China sent three new astronauts (the Shenzhou-20 crew) to its Tiangong space station, while three astronauts (the Shenzhou-19 crew) safely returned from the space station last week after six months in space.

It is important to remember that the rest of the world wants to advance in space even if the US chooses to chase its tail and destroy its own asset and reputation. None of this is necessary, but that is where we are.

One might even say the US is undergoing a ridiculous DEI purge at NASA and throughout the government in the same way China went through its ill-fated Cultural Revolution in the 1960s and 1970s.

Paul Krugman had a good piece on this, stating:

Once you’ve seen the parallel between what MAGA is trying to do and China’s Cultural Revolution, the similarities are everywhere. Maoists sent schoolteachers to do farm labor; Trumpists are talking about putting civil servants to work in factories.

We need to focus on the future again, and soon.

The Internet Satellite Race Continues, Almost

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Amazon hopes to challenge SpaceX’s Starlink system, but not just yet.

The launch planned for earlier this week place 27 internet satellites into orbit as part of Amazon’s Project Kuiper was scrubbed at the last minute. The United Launch Alliance (ULA) launch, scheduled for last Wednesday, was delayed due to bad weather.

If all goes according to plan, Project Kuiper will have about 1,600 satellites in orbit by the middle of next year. That would mean about 80 launches over that period, which seems somewhat unlikely given ongoing delays. In addition to ULA launches, Amazon is booking launches with Arianespace, Blue Origin, and SpaceX. When the project is complete, about 3,200 Kuiper internet satellites will be in orbit.

The Kuiper satellites will compete head-to-head with SpaceX’s Starlink (with its goal of 42,000 satellites) and China’s SpaceSail (with its goal of 15,000 satellites).

A new launch date for the first launch of the Kuiper internet satellites has not been announced yet.

Update: I forgot to mention another competitor – Eutelsat’s Oneweb in the European Union, which already has about 650 Internet satellites in Low Earth Orbit.

Second Update: This story, “Telecommunications Satellites and Space Exploration,” has a nice summary about how we arrived at the current moment with our satellite technology as well as what the future may hold.

Space Stories: More Space Tourists, Chinese Maglev Rocket Launches, and New Hubble Findings on Uranus

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Image (Credit): Launch of the Fram2 mission earlier this week. (SpaceX)

Here are some recent stories of interest.

—South China Morning Post: “SpaceX Launches Fram2: 4 Astronauts Seek to Make Historic Flight Over Earth’s Poles“

A SpaceX spacecraft carrying four international astronauts is on a pioneering journey circling Earth over its poles after launching Monday night from Florida…Fram2 follows in the footsteps of other commercial spaceflight ventures, including Inspiration4 and Polaris Dawn – two missions also bankrolled and led by billionaire Jared Isaacman. In fact, the Fram2 crew is now traveling on the same Dragon spacecraft that the Polaris Dawn crew rode to orbit in September for a five-day mission in which they completed a historic spacewalk.

—South China Morning Post: “China in Bid to Challenge SpaceX by Deploying Maglev Rocket Launch Pad by 2028“

In a bid to disrupt the United States’ long-held dominance in space exploration, China is quietly advancing a radical new rocket launch system – powered not by roaring engines but by electromagnetic force – that could propel satellites into orbit with unprecedented speed and efficiency. At the heart of the ambitious project is Galactic Energy, a private aerospace company that plans to debut the world’s first electromagnetic rocket launch pad by 2028, a project that could redraw the competitive lines of the global space industry.

—Space Telescope Science Institute: “20-Year Hubble Study of Uranus Yields New Atmospheric Insights“

Halfway through its fourth decade, Hubble’s long life has proven invaluable for studying the atmosphere of the mysterious ice giant Uranus. By repeatedly training Hubble on the distant cyan planet over the course of 20 years, researchers chronicled a two-decade story of seasonal changes. These astronomers have gained new understanding of the atmospheric dynamics of Uranus, which can serve as a proxy for studying exoplanets of similar size and composition.

Space Quote: Hurry Up with that New Administrator

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“The global space race is accelerating, and America faces an urgent challenge in maintaining its leadership in space exploration, technological innovation, and national security – especially in the face of China’s rapidly advancing space program…Jared Isaacman is uniquely qualified to deliver strong leadership that will strengthen NASA’s core programs and ensure the United States remains at the forefront of scientific discovery, space commerce, and exploration.”

-Statement by Tennessee Governor Bill Lee and six other governors in a letter to the Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation Committee regarding the appointment of NASA’s next Administrator. It is likely that the governors see the continuing disruptions at NASA, including the recent elimination of two departments and office of chief scientist, and understand that this destruction will probably continue without permanent leadership at the agency.

China is Building Its Own James Webb Space Telescope

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Image (Credit): Artist’s rendering of the China Space Station Telescope called Xuntian. (Changchun Institute of Optics, Fine Mechanics and Physics)

Just as we have competition with China for the next human to visit the Moon, we now have competition for the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST).

China has stated it plans to launch the China Space Station Telescope (CSST) in 2026, which should be as powerful as the JWST while having the extra benefit of remaining in Earth orbit. As a result, when compared to the JWST, the CSST will be easier to maintain as well as upgrade.

A Chinese paper on the new telescope noted the following regarding its potential:

It can simultaneously perform multi-band imaging and slitless spectroscopic wide- and deep-field surveys in ten years and an ultra-deep field (UDF) survey in two years, which are suitable for cosmological studies. Here we review several CSST cosmological probes, such as weak gravitational lensing, two-dimensional (2D) and three-dimensional (3D) galaxy clustering, galaxy cluster abundance, cosmic void, Type Ia supernovae (SNe Ia), and baryonic acoustic oscillations (BAO), and explore their capabilities and prospects in discovering new physics and opportunities in cosmology. We find that CSST will measure the matter distribution from small to large scales and the expansion history of the Universe with extremely high accuracy, which can provide percent-level stringent constraints on the property of dark energy and dark matter and precisely test the theories of gravity.

Of course, there is nothing wrong with a little competition. Let’s just hope NASA can get back on track after its latest budget problems as well as its current unstructured reorganization under the new White House. While the agency has other powerful telescopes under development, it doesn’t take much to throw things out of balance.