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Moon miss: 2 Chinese test satellites fail to reach orbit after rocket’s upper stage falters


‘The satellites have not been inserted into their designated orbit, and work is under way to address this problem,’ Chinese state media says.

China said a pair of its technology test satellites failed to reach a planned orbit on their way to the moon – a rare miss in the country’s space mission launch record in recent years. From there they would fly in formation and work with DRO-L – a third satellite that was successfully placed into low-Earth orbit by a Jielong 3 rocket last month – to test laser-based navigation technologies between the Earth and the moon, known as cislunar space. It is highly stable, allowing spacecraft to remain on track for a long time without using fuel, and is an advantageous waypoint for research and exploration, according to Chinese scientists.

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