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China plans to launch two more meteorological satellites in 2021
August 06, 2020

China plans to launch two more meteorological satellites in 2021, sources with the China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation.

One of the planned satellites is called Fengyun-3E (FY-3E). It will be the fifth member of the country's Fengyun-3 series of satellites in polar orbit and the world's first meteorological satellite in dawn-dusk orbit.

A dawn-dusk orbit is a sun-synchronous orbit in which the satellite tracks but never moves into the Earth's shadow. Since the satellite is close to the shadow, the part of Earth the satellite is directly above is always at sunset or sunrise, giving the orbit its name.

China launched the FY-4A, a scientific experiment satellite, into space in December 2016. The FY-4B will mark an upgrade of China's meteorological satellites in geostationary orbit.

As early as 1969, China started receiving, processing and using foreign meteorological satellite data. Meanwhile, the country has been developing its own meteorological satellite system.