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China Launched More Rockets Into Orbit In 2018 Than Any Other Country (technologyreview.com)
Privately funded space startups are changing China's space industry, helping it become a space power on par with the United States. "2018 is shaping up to be the first year in which more rockets reach Earth orbit from China than from any other country," reports MIT Technology Review. "As of mid-December, China had made 35 successful launches, as against 30 for the U.S."
"As American and Russian space programs struggle with uncertain budgets, China is expanding its efforts on every front: communications and reconnaissance satellites; a navigation and positioning constellation to rival America's GPS; a human spaceflight program; and ambitious space-science and robotic exploration projects. All of these are enabled by a menagerie of new rockets with advanced capabilities." Here's an excerpt from the report summarizing some of China's space ambitions: In 2014, the Chinese government decided to allow private investment in space-related industry. Landspace began with a few dozen people. It now has over 200 employees at a manufacturing base in Huzhou in eastern China and at assembly and testing facilities in X'ian, a central Chinese city. The company plans to work incrementally, beginning with nano-satellites -- devices weighing between 1 and 10 kilograms (2 to 22 pounds) -- then moving to larger cargoes and, eventually, into human spaceflight. In September 2018, iSpace launched three nanosatellites on a brief suborbital flight, becoming the first Chinese space startup to successfully get beyond Earth's atmosphere. Another company, LinkSpace, plans to launch a vertical takeoff, vertical landing rocket in 2020. Landspace, OneSpace, iSpace, LinkSpace, and ExPace (which fashions itself as a startup though it's a subsidiary of a state-owned enterprise) are the leaders of a bevy of lesser-known Chinese launch startups.
These launch companies are operating hand in hand with a number of new, privately funded Chinese companies that are focused on doing things in space, rather than on getting there. Spacety and Commsat, among others, are planning large constellations of small imagery and communication satellites. Such constellations -- whether Chinese or American -- are transforming aspects of the way space is used. By making low-resolution satellite imagery much cheaper to gather (among other novel applications for small satellites), they are catalyzing an era of more nimble commercial, scientific, and military experimentation.
"As American and Russian space programs struggle with uncertain budgets, China is expanding its efforts on every front: communications and reconnaissance satellites; a navigation and positioning constellation to rival America's GPS; a human spaceflight program; and ambitious space-science and robotic exploration projects. All of these are enabled by a menagerie of new rockets with advanced capabilities." Here's an excerpt from the report summarizing some of China's space ambitions: In 2014, the Chinese government decided to allow private investment in space-related industry. Landspace began with a few dozen people. It now has over 200 employees at a manufacturing base in Huzhou in eastern China and at assembly and testing facilities in X'ian, a central Chinese city. The company plans to work incrementally, beginning with nano-satellites -- devices weighing between 1 and 10 kilograms (2 to 22 pounds) -- then moving to larger cargoes and, eventually, into human spaceflight. In September 2018, iSpace launched three nanosatellites on a brief suborbital flight, becoming the first Chinese space startup to successfully get beyond Earth's atmosphere. Another company, LinkSpace, plans to launch a vertical takeoff, vertical landing rocket in 2020. Landspace, OneSpace, iSpace, LinkSpace, and ExPace (which fashions itself as a startup though it's a subsidiary of a state-owned enterprise) are the leaders of a bevy of lesser-known Chinese launch startups.
These launch companies are operating hand in hand with a number of new, privately funded Chinese companies that are focused on doing things in space, rather than on getting there. Spacety and Commsat, among others, are planning large constellations of small imagery and communication satellites. Such constellations -- whether Chinese or American -- are transforming aspects of the way space is used. By making low-resolution satellite imagery much cheaper to gather (among other novel applications for small satellites), they are catalyzing an era of more nimble commercial, scientific, and military experimentation.
The whole shuttle program was an overpriced failure. If you think that the failures in the shuttle program is limited to a "couple of failures" (assuming you are referring to the losses of Challenger and Columbia) you are probably misinformed. These failures were just the saddest consequences of the Shuttle program.
1. The completely ridiculous and outrageous budget forced the placement of the orbiter into a location relative to the booster rockets and tanks that killed 14 people.
2. The final design of the orbiters were 20% overweight---making them too heavy to launch many devices the Shuttle program was originally designed to handle (such as launching some satellites into polar orbit).
3. Two words: Tile Maintenance
4. Much lower launch rates (max of 9/yr versus projected 24 to 55).
5. The horrible safety culture at NASA and their vendors/contractors.
6. Cost overrun after cost overrun after cost overrun.... (Even when considering that it was a US government project.)
These are just a few of the program failures. People have written books about how bad the Shuttle program was and how bad NASA still is.
By the way, the main reason the Shuttle program ran as long as it did is because it was NASA's one egg in their basket. There was nothing to replace the "space truck" while the US built the new space station (eventually becoming the ISS) which, itself, was very behind schedule. Had the fall of the Soviet Union occurred earlier, along with Roscosmos' involvement in the ISS, the Shuttle program would most likely have been cancelled earlier.