China
Yuanwang: Shenzhou 7 measuring fleet
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| Yuanwang 6 |
On April 12th, Yuanwang 6 was delivered to Shanghai for the Shenzhou 7 spacewalk mission. It's stationed in the Pacific Ocean, as its sister ship, Yuanwang 5, which was put into use a year ago, is the Indian Ocean.
They were preceded by the Yuanwang 1, 2, 3, and 4. The four large ships are fitted with arrays of receiving and transmitting antennas and satellite tracking dishes.
Yuanwang 1 was built and put to use in 1977, and Yuanwang 2, a year later. They are China's first generation of marine composite tracking surveying stations.
The four Yuanwang ships have been heavily involved in the national manned space program since 1999.
China's first manned spacecraft, Shenzhou 5, was launched on October 15th, 2003. Within nine minutes of launch, the spacecraft entered into the monitoring area of Yuanwang 1.
Thousands of kilometers away, Yuanwang 2, 3 and 4 also detected the target one after another, based on the spacecraft's traces fixed by Yuanwang 1.
The four ships also took part in Shenzhou 6 survey and control missions 3 years ago.
The Yuanwang survey fleet has sailed to the three major oceans more than 50 times, covering a distance of nearly one and half million nautical miles. So far the fleet has carried out 68 survey and control missions for space flight with a success rate of 100 percent.
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Editor:Du Xiaodan
