With the help of the Long March 3B ("Great March 3B") missile China successfully launched two newest BeiDou-3 navigation satellites into space. The rocket soared into the sky on Sunday, November 5, at about 11:44 UTC from the site of the launch complex LC3 of the Sichang cosmodrome in Sichuan province.

Initially, the launch of this mission was planned for July, but after the partially unsuccessful launch of the Long March 3B missile and the subsequent unsuccessful launch of the Long March 5 missile, Beijing suspended the flights to orbit for almost three months.

The Long March 3B rocket was launched with the help of four YF-21C first-stage engines and four side-mounted booster blocks, each of which is equipped with one YF-25 engine.

These upper blocks were dropped after 2 minutes and 20 seconds after the start. Further, the rocket continued to move on the engines of the first stage for about 18 seconds, after which the separation of the first stage occurred.

Then the rocket continued to move with the DaFY-20-1 second-stage engine. After three minutes of flight on this engine there was a separation of the second stage.

The next part of the flight took place on the third-stage engine (10-20 minutes), after the separation of which the upper stage of the Yuanzheng-1 began its journey of 6 hours for the delivery of two satellites into orbit.

These two BeiDou-3 satellites will be in the medium earth orbit at an altitude of 21500 kilometers with an inclination of 55.5 degrees. The satellites are part of the BeiDou-3 Chinese navigation system, which will consist of 27 BeiDou-3M satellites located in the medium earth orbit, five BeiDou-3G satellites in the geostationary orbit and three BeiDou-3I satellites in the inclined geosynchronous orbit.

Source: Astronews.