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Rocket Lab launches mysterious spy satellites in 4th-ever US liftoff (video)
Mar 21, 2024
Rocket Lab launched from the U.S. for the fourth time ever on Thursday morning (March 21), sending mystery payloads aloft for the U.S. National Reconnaissance Office (NRO).
The NROL-123 mission — or "Live and Let Fly," as Rocket Lab called it — lifted off from the company's Launch Complex 2 (LC-2) at NASA's Wallops Flight Facility in Virginia on Thursday at 3:25 a.m. EDT (0725 GMT).
Like all 45 of Rocket Lab's previous orbital missions to date, NROL-123 employed Electron, a two-stage, 59-foot-tall (18 meters) rocket that gives small satellites dedicated rides to space. (The company is also developing a larger launch vehicle called Neutron, but it has yet to fly.)
NROL-123 sent three research missions skyward, Rocket Lab representatives said during the company's launch webcast on Thursday.
That's pretty much all we know about the payloads. The dearth of information is hardly surprising; the NRO builds and operates the United States' fleet of spy satellites and is generally tight-lipped about the nature and activities of those craft.
We do know, however, that the NRO awarded Rocket Lab the NROL-123 mission via a Rapid Acquisition of a Small Rocket (RASR) contract. "RASR enables the NRO to explore new opportunities for launching small satellites through a streamlined, commercial approach," Rocket Lab officials wrote in a mission description.
The NROL-123 payloads are scheduled to be deployed into orbit about an hour after liftoff. Rocket Lab didn't show that milestone, however; the company ended its launch webcast just under 11 minutes after liftoff, presumably at the request of the NRO.
NROL-123 was the fifth mission that Rocket Lab has launched for the NRO. The other four lifted off from the company's Launch Complex 1 (LC-1) on New Zealand's North Island.
LC-1 has hosted the vast majority of Rocket Lab's orbital launches to date — 42 of 46 now, to be precise. The other four have lifted off from LC-2, which hosted its first Electron launch in January 2023.
Rocket Lab is working to make the Electron's first stage reusable; the company has recovered boosters from the sea on a number of previous missions and has even successfully reflown a used engine. But NROL-123 apparently didn't feature any recovery activities; the press kit and the launch webcast made no mention of them.
https://www.space.com/rocket-lab-launch-nrol-123-live-and-let-fly
China launches second batch of Yunhai-2 satellites
March 21, 2024
China has launched a new batch of Yunhai-2 meteorological satellites likely for use by its military.
A Long March 2D with a Yuanzheng-3 upper stage rocket lifted off from Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in the Gobi Desert at 1:27 a.m. Eastern (0527 UTC) March 21. The China Aerospace Science and Technology Corp. (CASC), confirmed launch success around three hours later, also revealing the payloads for the mission to be the Yunhai-2 (02) batch of satellites.
The satellites were likely released into a series of orbits following a series of burns by the YZ-3 upper stage. The launch follows a similar mission from 2018 which saw a first group of six Yunhai-2 satellites put into orbit by a Long March 2D and YZ-3 combination.
These satellites are described only briefly as to be used mainly for atmospheric environment detection, space environment monitoring, disaster prevention and reduction, and scientific experiments, according to Chinese state media.
The Yunhai series are, however, assessed to be military meteorological satellites by some Western analysts. They are believed to use Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) Radio Occultation (GNSS-RO) to collect atmospheric data. GNSS-RO detects changes to GNSS signals as they pass through Earth’s atmosphere and ionosphere providing data useful for weather forecasting and atmospheric processes, ionospheric research and other areas.
Curiously, the first Yunhai-2 satellites, launched in late 2018, were inserted into initial, curricular orbits, with three orbiting at 520 km and another three at 1,095 km. However, all six are now in roughly circular 800 km orbits, either raising or lowering their orbits significantly in mid-2019.
The YZ-3 (“Expedition-3”) is equipped with a 5kN main engine and an autonomous navigation and guidance system. It can perform over 20 autonomous rapid orbital maneuvers. It is primarily for deploying multiple satellites into different orbits, according to the Shanghai Academy of Spaceflight Technology (SAST). SAST also produces the Long March 2D.
Last week’s malfunction of a YZ-1S upper stage did not impact Thursday’s mission. That upper stage was developed by the China Academy of Launch Vehicle Technology (CALT), another CASC institute.
U.S. Space Force tracking has the YZ-1S from the DRO-A/B launch in a highly-elliptical high Earth orbit. Orbital data, from March 15, has the upper stage in a 524 x 132,577-kilometer-orbit, someway short of reaching the moon. The pair of small satellites were intended to enter a lunar distant retrograde orbit (DRO). China has provided no updates since a terse media note acknowledging the malfunction.
The launch of the Yunhai-2 (02) satellites is China’s 13th orbital mission of 2024. China is aiming to launch around 100 times across 2024, with around 70 to be conducted by CASC. China’s commercial launch service providers are planning around 30 launches.
The previous launch, on March 19 Eastern, sent the Queqiao-2 lunar communications relay satellite towards the moon.
https://spacenews.com/china-launches-second-batch-of-yunhai-2-satellites/
OUT OF THIS WORLD Chilling moment saucer-shaped UFO hovers over oil rig near where locals believe there is an ‘alien base’
Updated: 16:51, 21 Mar 2024
Locals claim the area off the coast of Mexico is home to an underwater alien hideout called Amupac that has long protected the community from natural disasters.
A crew member onboard the oil rig near Tampico snapped up images of the bizarre objects.
One shows a small aircraft with glowing lights at the bottom of it soaring in the sky.
At least six amber lights can be seen underneath the potential spaceship that is also surrounded by a silver disc.
Another picture shows three illuminated dots in the air making up a peculiar triangle shape.
So far there have been no explanations for the floating objects.
Both crafts are believed to have suddenly appeared before quickly jetting off and never returning.
The images were first taken in October 2023, but have only just been shown online.
THE LEGEND OF AMUPAC
The mysterious Amupac is thought to sit off Miramar Beach in the region - exactly where the oil rig was floating.
According to locals, there hasn't been a hurricane in the area since 1967 when the legend begun.
The idea of a secret alien base lurking beneath the water came from local news outlet El Sol de Tampico newspaper.
They ran a sensational story headlined "Platillos Voladores Sobre Tampico", or Flying Saucers Over Tampico.
It quoted local officers as saying they've witnessed "nine unidentified objects" in the sky.
They also said that "thousands of inhabitants' saw objects in the sky".
Despite being such a bizarre theory, Tampico has been seemingly protected by natural disasters in the past.
Five major hurricanes ripped through Tampico and nearby Ciudad Madero across three decades between 1933 and 1966.
But since then not a single one has attacked the region with all natural disasters simply disappearing or missing the area.
Most recently, devastating Tropical Storm Karl was all but set to strike on the shoreline in 2013 after terrorising the neighboring towns and villages.
But at the last moment, weather radars showed the cyclone taking a sharp turn and completely missing the area entirely.
Before it continued on the Gulf Coast of Mexico, flooding several communities and even causing one death.
One of the main theories behind the underwater alien stronghold is the use of magnetic fields.
Some people claim a series of meter-long aluminum, iron and copper alloy bars were secretly buried in the seafloor by aliens when they first visited.
This has seemingly kept the area protected from disasters.
And the whole region has bought into the idea as they have named restaurants after martians and even sell a plethora of alien-based stuffed toys and memorabilia, VICE reports.
The beach has even be dubbed "Playa Protegida" or the Protected Beach.
Dr Rosario Romero, a climate scientist at the National Autonomous University of Mexico, even called the long-lasting streak of good weather in the area interesting.
But she did note it wasn't unexplainable.
https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/26834164/saucer-shaped-ufo-oil-rig-alien-base-amupac-mexico/
Looks like today's the day