TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — China’s satellite launch did not appear to prioritize safety, Taiwan Space Agency Deputy Director Chu Chung-hui (朱崇惠) said on Tuesday (Jan. 9).
On Tuesday afternoon, a satellite named the Einstein Probe blasted off into space via a Long March-C rocket from the Xichang Satellite Launch Center in Sichuan Province.
Chu said that due to multiple segments detaching during the satellite's launch, they could potentially fall anywhere, posing a safety concern, per Liberty Times. However, China does not seem to pay attention to these kinds of issues, he said.
The deputy director said typically, trajectories are set over the ocean to avoid flying over land areas.
Satellites are launched using multi-stage rockets that are not intended to enter Earth's orbit, Chu said. The possibility of debris falling back to the surface is what prompted the Ministry of National Defense to issue a national-level alert via text message on Tuesday, he added.
The text alert erroneously called the satellite a missile in English, causing concern that such a mistake could be made. The defense ministry later apologized for the mistake, saying, “The wording of the original system was not updated simultaneously to accurately express that the launched object was a satellite rather than a missile.”
The Einstein Probe is a joint project between the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the European Space Agency, and Germany's Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics.