At 6:49 on July 5, 2024, the Long March 6A Yao-7 launch vehicle successfully placed the Tianhui 5-02 satellite group into the destination orbit at the Taiyuan Satellite Launch Center, signaling a complete success of the launch mission. This success marks the beginning of intensive launch missions in the second half of the year. The Tianhui 5-02 satellite group mainly carries out such tasks as geographic information mapping, land resource surveys, and scientific research and experiments. Both the satellite and the launch vehicle are developed by Shanghai Academy of Spaceflight Technology. 

Launch Vehicle Test Team: Firm up our confidence of success and a sense of reverence while achieving ongoing success

The Long March 6A launch vehicle, which implemented this launch mission, was a new generation medium-lift launch vehicle with solid-fuel and liquid propellant, with a payload capacity of no less than 4.5 tons for deploying satellites into a 700-kilometer sun-synchronous orbit. With a modular, combined, and series development approach, various configurations can be developed for the launch vehicle through adjustments of boosters in the future to meet the diverse and intensive launch requirements of satellites.

In this mission, an extended satellite fairing with a diameter of 4.2 meters was adopted. After arriving at the launch site, both the satellite and launch vehicle teams thoroughly broke down the procedures for coordinating the operations between the satellite system and the launch site system, and confirmed the work details and important steps in operation several times, thus ensuring a coordinated operation process between the satellite system and the launch site system.

During their work at the launch site, the test team members always stayed energetic and positive, and maintained firm confidence and a sense of reverence for the mission as they achieved one successful launch after another. Under the leadership of the chief designer and chief commander of the model team, the team members avoided complacency, broke away from routine thinking, and adhered to a strict, careful, serious, and practical work ethic in every operation, test and data interpretation. They stayed focused, strived for top-notch quality, and finally ensured the successful completion of this launch mission.

This launch mission is the 6^th launch of Long March 6A launch vehicle, the 212^th flight test of the Long March series of launch vehicles developed by Shanghai Academy of Spaceflight Technology, and the 527^th launch of China's Long March series of launch vehicles. 

Satellite Test Team: Contributing to building China into a space power through solid steps and concrete actions 

The development team of the Tianhui 5-02 satellite group consistently follows SAST's new development philosophy in the satellite field. Through early planning, strict implementation, and adherence to schedule, they have comprehensively improved the efficiency and effectiveness of satellite development.

Faced with challenges such as the extensive workload, tight deadline, and concurrent tasks during the development period, the Model Project Office assessed the situation proactively and comprehensively. They adopted a strategy of handling simple tasks with ease, treating complex procedures with seriousness, implementing critical phases methodically, and advancing mature steps swiftly, and streamlined the development process rationally. This approach has effectively addressed the severe challenges posed by the urgent time constraint of whole satellite AIT owing to the delayed subsystem delivery. Through process optimization and multi-pronged measures, the team has successfully increased the efficiency of whole satellite AIT time by 20%.

With a tight focus on key test tasks, the satellite development team continuously conducted rechecks and confirmations of critical processes such as polarity rechecks, traveling wave tube helix rechecks, and comprehensive reviews, accumulating over 360 quality assurance forms and more than 6900 photos at the launch site.

In response to the risks posed by changes in technical status and adjustments in testing functions, the satellite development team ensured technical consistency by proactively reviewing and confirming the implementation of changes in design documents ahead of time. Meanwhile, the team held over ten specialized meetings at the launch site on subsystem test coverage and data analysis, and continuously performed “five comparisons” in satellite test data interpretation. They conducted repeated quality checks and confirmations to fully implement the responsibility for test data analysis, thus ensuring comprehensive coverage of test items and no missed detections of abnormal data. Through these efforts, they have strictly guaranteed the final step before launch. The development team of the Tianhui 5-02 satellite group will continue to work hard and practically, contributing to the building of a space power through their concrete actions.