Dong Fang Hong 46

Launch data: Designation 25730 / 99025A Launch date 10 May 1999 - 01:33 UT Launch site Taiyuan Launch vehicle CZ-4B(#54) Mission Meteorology Earth orbit: Perigee/Apogee 849/898 km Inclination 98.8° Period 102.1 min

Mission details:

• Downlink: 180.008 & 480.020 MHz + 1.7005 & 1.7045 GHz
• On January 11, 2007, the satellite was destroyed in a Chinese anti-satellite test.
• According to US government sources, China has carried out a test of an kinetic-energy antisatellite weapon. The intercept occurred at 2226 UTC on Jan 11, destroying China's own elderly Feng Yun 1C weather satellite which was launched in 1999. The weapon was launched on a suborbital medium range ballistic missile, reportedly from the Xichang space center. The FY-1C was in an 843 x 862 km x 98.7 deg orbit; the initial debris cataloged ranges from 165 x 850 km to 850 x 3500 km, a wide range of heights indicating an energetic fragmentation with delta-Vs along the direction of motion of -190 to +550 m/s. Of course, we are missing the tail of dV significantly less than -190 since those objects would reenter immediately. As of Jan 27, over 500 objects had been cataloged by the US, mostly with velocities of order 500m/s or less relative to the original orbit.
• The type of missile used has not been identified; the most likely candidate is probably the solid-fuel DF-21 missile. CNN quoted US sources as indicating that this is the fourth launch in the program following three previous failures; another source suggests that there was only one previous failure, and yet other reports give other numbers.
• This is the first known antisatellite intercept since the USA's Delta 180 flight in 1986 (not counting the accidental events of Progress/Spektr and DART/MUBLCOM, which were due to lousy driving and not deliberate weapons tests).
• As of Feb 20,2007 - 786 pieces had been cataloged from the destruction of the Chinese FY-1C satellite in a space weapons test, breaking the record and officially making the FY-1C destruction the worst orbital debris event since the formation of the Moon. By Feb 25 the number had reached 916 pieces.