Taiyuan Credit - © Mark Wade

China's launch site for launch of polar orbiting satellites, also known as Wuzhai. Taiyuan Satellite Launch Center (TSLC) is situated in Kelan County, the northwest part of Shanxi Province, 280 km by road from Taiyuan City. The head office of the launch center is located in Taiyuan City. TSLC has two feeder railway that connect with Ningwu-Kelan railway, which crosses the launch center and joins Northern Tongtu railway at Ningpu County. Highways lead to all TSLC sites. Taiyuan Airport is 300 km by road from the launch site and can accept jumbo aircraft. TSLC is primarily used to launch meteorological satellites, earth resource satellites and scientific satellites. It consists of the Technical Center, the Mission Command and Control Center. Telemetry, Tracking, and Communications Systems, and necessary technical and logistic support systems. TSLC is located in a temperate zone, with an elevation of 1,400km to 1,900km above sea level. It is cool in summer. Aside from the space launches, the facility is also used for missile tests. Several valleys leading north and south from the rail line shelter a number of IRBM/ICBM launch pads.

• Name: Pad 1. Latitude: 37.5000 N. Longitude: 112.6000 E. Launch Pads: 1. CZ-2C/SD, CZ-4A, CZ-4B.

Taiyuan Credit - © Mark Wade

• 1980 February 15 - Last DF-5 partial range test. Launch Vehicle: DF-5. Other sources do not list this test.

• 1985 May - Test mission Launch Vehicle: DF-21. Apogee: 500 km (310 mi).

• 1988? - Test mission Launch Vehicle: DF-15. Apogee: 100 km (60 mi).

• 1988 September 6 20:30 - FY-1A Launch Vehicle: CZ-4A. Chang Zheng 4 CZ4-1 (19) LC: LC1. Apogee: 895 km (556 mi). Experimental weather satellite. First use of new launch site and launch vehicle. Failed after 38 days due to problems with attitude control system.

• 1990 September 3 00:53 - FY-1B Launch Vehicle: CZ-4A. Chang Zheng 4 CZ4-2 (24) LC: LC1. Apogee: 897 km (557 mi). Experimental weather satellite. Operated for over a year.

• 1992 April 29 - Test mission Launch Vehicle: DF-21. Failure.

• 1992 May - Test mission Launch Vehicle: DF-21. Failure.

• 1993? - Test mission Launch Vehicle: DF-21. Failure.

• 1995 May 29 - Test mission Launch Vehicle: CZ-1D. Chang Zheng 1D Apogee: 1,000 km (600 mi).

• 1995 Jul - Test mission Launch Vehicle: DF-21. Apogee: 500 km (310 mi).

• 1995 November 10 - Test mission Launch Vehicle: DF-21. Apogee: 1,000 km (600 mi).

• 1996 January 10 - Test mission Launch Vehicle: DF-21. Apogee: 1,000 km (600 mi).

• 1996 December 28 - Test mission Launch Vehicle: DF-21. Apogee: 1,000 km (600 mi).

• 1997 September 1 14:00 - Iridium Launch Vehicle: CZ-2C/SD. Chang Zheng 2C-III/SD CZ2C-15 (47) LC: LC1. Apogee: 633 km (393 mi). Plane 5. Ascending node 271.9 degrees. Dummy satellite.

• 1997 Nov - Test mission Launch Vehicle: CZ-1D. Chang Zheng 1D Apogee: 1,000 km (600 mi).

• 1997 December 8 07:16 - Iridium 42 Launch Vehicle: CZ-2C/SD. Chang Zheng 2C-III/SD CZ2C-16 (49) LC: LC1. Apogee: 780 km (480 mi). Plane 6. Ascending node 325.8 degrees.

• 1998 March 25 17:01 - Iridium 51 Launch Vehicle: CZ-2C/SD. Chang Zheng 2C-III/SD CZ2C-17 (50) LC: LC1. Apogee: 756 km (469 mi). Plane 4. Ascending node 262.5 degrees. Not in service.

• 1998 May 2 09:16 - Iridium 69 Launch Vehicle: CZ-2C/SD. Chang Zheng 2C-III/SD CZ2C-18 (51) LC: LC1. Apogee: 783 km (486 mi). Plane 2. Ascending node 199.4 degrees. Not in service.

• 1998 August 19 23:01 - Iridium 3 Launch Vehicle: CZ-2C/SD. Chang Zheng 2C-III/SD CZ2C-19 (54) LC: LC1. Apogee: 779 km (484 mi). Plane 2. Ascending node 199.4 degrees.

• 1998 December 19 11:39 - Iridium 11 Launch Vehicle: CZ-2C/SD. Chang Zheng 2C-III/SD CZ2C-20 (55) LC: LC1. Apogee: 780 km (480 mi). Plane 2. Ascending node 197 degrees. Parking orbit.

• 1999 May 10 01:33 - FY-1C Launch Vehicle: CZ-4B. Chang Zheng 4B CZ4B-1 (56) LC: LC1. Apogee: 869 km (539 mi). Operational weather satellite. First launch of stretched CZ-4B booster. After retirement the satellite was destroyed in the first test of the Chinese ASAT weapon on 11 January 2007.

• 1999 June 11 17:15 - Iridium 14A Launch Vehicle: CZ-2C/SD. Chang Zheng 2C-III/SD CZ2C-21 (57) LC: LC1. Apogee: 711 km (441 mi).

• 1999 August 2 - Test mission Launch Vehicle: DF-31. Apogee: 1,000 km (600 mi).

• 1999 October 14 03:15 - ZY-1 Launch Vehicle: CZ-4B. Chang Zheng 4B CZ4B-2 (58) LC: LC1. Apogee: 774 km (480 mi). China-Brazil Earth Resources Satellite. China's first earth resources satellite, known as ZY-1, weighed 1,540 kilograms. Chief designer was Chen Yiyuan. The satellite, a joint project of China and Brazil, was designed to gather information on the environment, agriculture and urban planning through remote sensing images and data transmitted to China, Brazil and other countries. Planned lifetime was two years. The satellite circled the Earth 14 times a day and the groundtrack repeated after 26 days. By 23 February 2000 it had taken more than 20,000 high quality images. It was formally handed over for operational use on March 2 2000. The High Resolution CCD Camera had a resolution of 20 meters in the visible spectrum. The camera could point up to 32 degrees to either side of vertical, imaging the earth's surface stereoscopically. After 177 days the Wide Field Imager failed in early May 2000. Other devices, including the high resolution CCD camera, continue to work normally.

• 2000 September 1 03:25 - ZY-2 Launch Vehicle: CZ-4B. Chang Zheng 4B CZ4B-3 (62) LC: LC1. Apogee: 501 km (311 mi). The ZY-2 (Ziyuan-2 ('Resource-2'), while disguised as a civilian earth monitoring system, was actually code-named Jianbing-3 and was China's first high-resolution military imaging satellite. The cover story of the official Xinhua news agency was that the civilian remote sensing system would be used primarily in territorial surveying, city planning, crop yield assessment, disaster monitoring and space science experimentation. However the satellite was placed at a much lower altitude than the ZY-1 satellite and US intelligence sources indicated that it was a photo-reconnaissance satellite for exclusively military purposes, such as targeting missiles at US and Taiwanese forces. The new satellite was believed to employ digital-imaging technology and to have a resolution of 2 m or less. The satellite was designed and built by the Chinese Academy of Space Technology and was developed indigenously. It was said to be more advanced than earlier sensing satellites and was expected to have an orbital life of two years. The camera provided more than three times the resolution of the ZY-1 earth resources satellite. The Zi Yuan 2 satellite may have used the CBERS Sino-Brazilian bus of the earlier ZY-1. However it was also said to be of new design and demonstrated the capability to maneuver in orbit, adjusting its orbit after launch. In October 2000 Chinese scientists denied that the ZY-2 satellite had a military mission. It was said to be a remote-sensing satellite equipped with CCD cameras and an infrared multispectral scanner that could only identify objects on the ground with a resolution of several dozen meters to 1 km.

• 2000 November 4 - Test mission Launch Vehicle: DF-31. Apogee: 1,000 km (600 mi).

• 2000 December 16 - Test mission Launch Vehicle: DF-31. Apogee: 1,000 km (600 mi).

• 2002 January 3 12:15 - Test mission Launch Vehicle: CZ-1D. Failure. Chang Zheng 1D Apogee: 100 km (60 mi).

• 2002 January 3 12:15 - CZ-1 Missile Technology Test Launch Vehicle: CZ-1. Launch vehicle failure.. Chinese People's Liberation Army test launch with dummy warhead. Suborbital - failure. Delayed from early November 2001.

• 2002 May 15 01:50 - Hai Yang 1 Launch Vehicle: CZ-4B. Chang Zheng 4B CZ4B-4 (67) LC: LC1. Apogee: 799 km (496 mi). The HY-1 (Haiyang-1) marine observation satellite separated shortly after the FY-1D. The 360 kg HY-1 was based on the SJ-5 bus and carried an IR radiometer and CCD imager for oceanographic studies. Between May 21 and May 26, HY-1 lowered its orbit to 793 x 799 km using on-board propulsion.

• 2002 September 15 10:30 - HTSTL-1 Launch Vehicle: KT-1. Second stage failure.. Kaituozhe 1 First attempted launch of the all-solid-propellant KT-1 launch vehicle. The 50 kg test satellite, built by university students, was to have been placed in a 300 km polar orbit.

• 2002 October 27 03:17 - ZY-2 Launch Vehicle: CZ-4B. Chang Zheng 4B LC: LC1. Apogee: 483 km (300 mi). JB-3 2 was nominally a Chinese (PRC) remote sensing satellite, although US intelligence sources indicated it had primarily an intelligence imaging mission. JB-3 2 was the name adopted by the USSPACECOM. Most news reports from China and elsewhere use different names: ZY-2B (acronym for ZiYuan-2B, translated as Resource-2B), and Zhong Guo Zi Yuan Er Hao, translated as China Resource 2. No information was available on the instruments onboard the JB-3 2, but officially it was intended 'for territorial survey, environment monitoring and protection, urban planning, crop yield assessment, disaster monitoring, and space scientific experiments'. The initial orbital parameters of this sun-synchronous satellite were period 94.1 min, apogee 483 km, perigee 470 km, and inclination 97.4°.

• 2003 September 16 - Kaituozhe 1 Launch Vehicle: KT-1. Fourth stage failed to ignite.. Second attempted launch of KT-1. The launch was intended to place a 40 kg microsatellite called PS-2 into a 300 x 300 km polar orbit.

• 2003 October 21 03:16 - ZY-1-2 (CBERS-2) Launch Vehicle: CZ-4B. CZ-4B LC: LC1. Apogee: 750 km (460 mi). Delayed from late 2001, September 3 2002, March 14 and September 2003. Second China-Brazil Earth Resources Satellite (CBERS 2).

• 2004 July 25 07:05 - Tan Ce 2 Launch Vehicle: CZ-2C. CZ-2C/SM LC: LC1. Apogee: 38,574 km (23,968 mi). Delayed from June, July 20

• 2004 September 8 23:14 - SJ-6A Launch Vehicle: CZ-4B. LC: LC1. Apogee: 593 km (368 mi). It was announced that the two satellites had a design life of at least two years, and would be used to probe the space environment, radiation and its effects, record space physical environment parameters, and conduct other related space experiments. The two satellites were built by the Shanghai Academy of Space Flight Technology and Dongfanghong Satellite Company under subcontract to the China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation. The scientific instruments aboard the satellites were mainly manufactured by the China Electronics Technology Corporation. Some Western observors believed the mission of the satellites included electronic intelligence technology tests.

• 2004 November 6 03:10 - ZY-2C Launch Vehicle: CZ-4B. LC: LC1. Apogee: 504 km (313 mi). Zi Yuan 2-3 was a low earth orbit digital imaging spacecraft used by the Chinese government, probably for both civilian and military reconnaissance purposes.

• 2006 April 26 22:48 - Yaogan 1 Launch Vehicle: CZ-4B. LC: LC1. Apogee: 630 km (390 mi). Remote sensing satellite built by the Shanghai SAST Group. In reality it was the first Chinese synthetic aperture radar military surveillance satellite.

• 2006 October 23 23:34 - SJ-6-2A SJ-6C Launch Vehicle: CZ-4B. Replaced the SJ-6 Group 1 satellites A and B. Official purpose was to measure the space environment, but foreign analysts suspected a SIGINT role.

• 2007 April 11 03:27 - Haiyang 1B Launch Vehicle: CZ-2C. Apogee: 815 km (506 mi). Oceanographic satellite equipped with a 10-band ocean color scanner, a 4-band CCD imager with 250-meter resolution, and an infrared water profile radiometer.

• 2007 September 19 03:26 - CBERS-2B Launch Vehicle: CZ-4B. Apogee: 775 km (481 mi). Third China-Brazil joint earth resources satellite. Much higher resolution optics and multispectral sensors expected to be useful for some military applications as well. The satellite raised its orbit to its operational altitude of 773 km two days after launch.

• McDowell, Jonathan, Jonathan's Space Home Page, Harvard University, 1997-present. Jonathan McDowell's complete on-line listing of all objects orbited and over 20,000 rocket launches Accessed at: http://www.planet4589.org/jsr.html.

• Official Site of the Topic, Information obtained from the manufacturer or operator's official web site.