China Successfully Launched Four Weather Satellites

News Desk

Islamabad: China successfully launched four Tianmu-1 weather satellites into space from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in northwest China on Wednesday.

The satellites, the Tianmu-1 03, 04, 05, 06meteorological constellation, were launched by a Kuaizhou-1A carrier rocket at 5:09 p.m. (Beijing Time) and have entered pre-set orbit. They will be mainly used to provide commercial meteorological data services. It was the 19th flight mission of the Kuaizhou-1A rockets.

The new storm trackers, sent into orbit on a rocket built by US company Rocket Lab, can fly over hurricanes (or typhoons in the Pacific) every hour, compared to every six hours with current satellites.

NASA scientist Will McCarty said, “Researchers will be able to see storms evolve on an hourly basis. We still need the large satellites.”

“What we get from this is the ability to add more information to the flagship satellites that we already have,” he added.

A second Rocket Lab-built vessel is due to launch in about two weeks, carrying two more satellites to complete a small constellation of four storm-tracking satellites. The information gathered on rainfall, temperature, and humidity could help scientists determine where a hurricane will make landfall and how intense it will be, helping people living in coastal areas be better prepared for possible evacuations.

“Many operational organisations like the National Hurricane Centre, the Joint Typhoon Warning Centre, and many others are ready to receive tropical imagery to help inform their forecasters,” said NASA Programme Executive Ben Kim.

In the long term, a better understanding of the formation and evolution of these storms could help improve climate models.

The constellation was originally intended to have six satellites, not four, but the first two were lost when a US Astra rocket malfunctioned shortly after lift off last year. Hurricanes, or typhoons, are becoming more powerful as the ocean surface warms, scientists say.