China comes a step closer to crewed moon mission

China carried out a key flight test on Wednesday of a new rocket and spaceship combination meant for use in a manned lunar mission, moving a step closer toward its goal of sending Chinese astronauts to the moon around 2030.

The test also marked the first successful attempt by a Chinese rocket to return to Earth safely, making it a historic feat in China's efforts to build reusable rockets. Currently, only the United States has operational reusable rockets.

At 11 am, a prototype first-stage booster of the Long March 10 heavy-lift rocket blasted off from the Wenchang Space Launch Site, a coastal spaceport in Hainan province, and soared into the skies carrying a prototype of the Mengzhou spaceship.

After a short flight, the booster reached a critical point of maximum dynamic pressure, or Max Q, which is a challenging moment for any rocket's ascent because the aerodynamic forces acting on the vehicle are at their highest.

At this point, the Mengzhou prototype's return capsule separated from the Long March 10 booster and was carried away by a rocket-powered escape tower atop it. Seconds later, on reaching a predetermined altitude, the capsule separated from the escape tower, and deployed its parachutes.

The capsule was later retrieved by recovery personnel after it landed in a designated area in the South China Sea.

Meanwhile, the Long March 10 booster continued flying upward. At a certain level, its engines were temporarily shut down to let the rocket coast by inertia. As soon as the booster crossed the Karman Line, the globally recognized boundary between Earth's atmosphere and the edge of space, the booster's grid fins unfolded and the reaction control system was activated to adjust its position and regulate its descent trajectory.

During the descent, some of the booster's engines reignited twice in succession to work with the grid fins and the reaction control system, in order to reduce the drop speed, maintain the desired position, and to make the booster hover as it approached the sea surface.

In the final second of these sophisticated maneuvers, all engines stopped operating to let the gigantic vessel splash down into the sea, marking the successful completion of the entire test. Near this designated splashdown area, a mobile recovery platform simulated the recovery process using real-time telemetry data sent back from the rocket.

According to the China Manned Space Agency, this is the first flight test of the Long March 10 prototype, the country's first Max Q escape test for a spacecraft, the first sea splashdown of a crew spaceship's return capsule and a rocket's first-stage booster, and also the first operation at the newly built heavy rocket launch tower at the Wenchang spaceport.

The test has successfully verified the first-stage ascent and recovery phases of the Long March 10 rocket, as well as the Mengzhou's Max Q escape and recovery capabilities, accumulating valuable data and experience for manned lunar missions, it noted.

Zhu Pingping, head engineer of China Aerospace Science and Technology Corp, the country's dominant State-owned space contractor, who took part in the test, said this was the first time in the global space community that a flight test included a Max Q escape operation and booster recovery trial at the same time. Zhu said that engineers examined the booster's performance and capabilities, malfunction detection, navigation and control, and heat-resistance systems during the flight, noting that the return flight of the booster was full of risks and challenges.

"The booster had to withstand extremely high temperatures and aerodynamic loads as it flew back to Earth. Its maximum heat flux and dynamic pressure were both the highest among all rocket recovery tests ever done in the country, imposing stringent requirements on the rocket's structure, thermal protection system and altitude control," he said.

Deng Kaiwen, deputy project manager of the Mengzhou program, said that designers intended to use the Max Q test to check whether the vessel was capable of activating its escape system at that challenging moment, in order to bring astronauts back safely.

"The test required a very high level of reliability and safety on the Mengzhou's rocket-powered escape tower and computers, because they would be exposed to a sophisticated aerodynamic situation at the point of separation," Deng added.

Both the Long March 10 carrier rocket and the Mengzhou spaceship are in the final stages of their research and development at CASC. They are among the key components of China's ambitious endeavor to send its astronauts to the moon before the end of the decade.

The Long March 10 is a brand-new launch vehicle designed by the China Academy of Launch Vehicle Technology. The model consists of a core booster and several side boosters. It is 92.5 meters tall and five meters wide, with a liftoff weight of 2,189 metric tons and a thrust of 2,678 tons. This rocket model is capable of transporting spacecraft weighing at least 27 tons to an Earth-moon transfer trajectory, according to its designers.

The Long March 10 will also have a shorter variant, without side boosters. It will be 67 meters tall and have a liftoff weight of about 740 tons. With a carrying capacity of 14 tons, it will be used to send astronauts or cargo loads to the Tiangong space station in low-Earth orbit.

Designers said the first two stages of the core boosters on both configurations are basically identical, and the first-stage booster of both configurations will be reusable. While the moon-mission variant includes a third-stage booster, the shorter variant has none, they added.

The Mengzhou spaceship is built by the China Academy of Space Technology. Upon its commissioning, the Mengzhou will gradually replace the Shenzhou model, which has been in service for nearly three decades for China's manned spaceflights.

The Mengzhou spaceship is nearly 9 meters long and 4.5 meters in diameter, and it weighs 22 tons.