Less than three weeks into 2024, it’s already been a busy year for developments in space. And many of those developments are coming from the Asia Pacific.
China has launched a set of weather satellites from the deck of a ship.
India has put a spacecraft in orbit to study the sun, and in South Korea, a new national space agency will be in place by this spring.
Three commercial weather satellites were launched from a ship in the Yellow Sea on Thursday — propelled by the Gravity-1 rocket.
The media outlet Space.com described the vehicle built by the Chinese company Orienspace as the most powerful Chinese commercial rocket that’s been launched.
India’s launch of a solar observatory in the first week of January is the latest development for that country’s growing space program.
It’s the initial step of a five-year mission which is in part aimed at getting a better understanding of space weather, which are variations in the environment in the distance between the Earth and the sun.
And last week, South Korea’s Minister of Science announced the country will launch a new space agency in May.
The government said the Korea Aerospace Administration will pursue joint projects with space research institutes in the United States and Japan.
The agency will also work with private industry, with a goal of helping to create half a million jobs in the field by the year 2045.
The government organization will start with a staff of about 300.
