Nation's satellite data reception coverage reaches new heights

For Shi Shengpu and his colleagues, the upcoming Spring Festival carries special significance — it will be the first time they celebrate the holiday at the Mohe station of the China Remote Sensing Satellite Ground Station, which commenced operations on Dec 12 in China's northernmost city, Mohe, Heilongjiang province.

Developed by the Chinese Academy of Sciences' Aerospace Information Research Institute, the Mohe station is the highest-latitude satellite data receiving facility in China, representing a significant leap in its land observation satellite data reception capabilities.

Taking advantage of its unique geographical position, it has expanded China's satellite reception coverage by approximately 4 million square kilometers, according to Shi, director of the station.

The breakthrough significantly enhances China's observational capabilities in polar and high-latitude regions, improving both the efficiency and coverage of satellite data acquisition, which is crucial for applications such as land surveys, environmental protection, weather forecasting, and disaster monitoring.

While remote sensing satellites orbit the Earth and provide a wealth of valuable observational data, the ground stations receive and process the information to meet human needs for understanding the planet.

The Mohe station has built three satellite data receiving systems boasting a capability of receiving S/X dual-band and dual-polarization data, with each system processing an average of more than 24 tracks per day.

The station currently supports data reception tasks for 25 national land observation satellites, including those in the resource, environmental disaster reduction, and high-resolution series.

With near-real-time transmission, fully automated reception capabilities and key technical indicators reaching international advanced levels, the station successfully had received data from 36,001 satellite tracks, acquiring over 1,775 terabytes of data, with a data reception success rate of over 99.79 percent by the end of 2025.

"It also extends the daily reception time of single polar-orbiting satellites by about 24 minutes, an increase of over 20 percent," Shi said.

In fact, Shi and his colleagues have spent over three years on the construction of the Mohe station.

"Ahead of the 2023 Spring Festival, we received the notification to work with the engineering and technical team from the Miyun station to advance the construction of the Mohe station and set up an emergency system for data reception verification," Shi said. "Almost at the same time, the reports about a record low temperature of minus 53 C in Mohe presented daunting challenges ahead, but we were determined to meet them."

Mohe's extremely cold climate posed the greatest challenge to the construction.

With average monthly temperatures below 0 C for over seven months each year and a frost-free period of only about 90 days, builders had to race against time.

During the winter of 2023, the Mohe station underwent its first winter trial operation, with extreme cold conditions and prolonged darkness becoming daily challenges for the team.

"By 3 pm, nightfall had already descended and we had to trek through knee-deep snow between the dormitory and the station, a journey that took half an hour," he said. "In the unfenced area, wild animal tracks were common sights, and falling into hidden snow pits was almost routine."

As a core participant in the project, Shi remarked, "All the hardships have turned into a sense of achievement and honor as we witness the Mohe station playing an important role in the national network."

Built and put into operation in December 1986, the China Remote Sensing Satellite Ground Station undertakes the data reception tasks of all civilian land observation satellites and space science satellites, achieving real-time and seamless data reception covering the entire territory of China.