China's Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center on Thursday said it will launch an experimental orbiter in the coming days.
The orbiter, SJ-11-02, will be carried into space by China's indigenous Long March II-C rocket, said a press release provided by the center.
Currently, the Shijian series satellite and rocket are awaiting the right conditions for launch and all preparations for the launch were going smoothly, according to the press release which gives no further details.
related report from Encyclopedia Astronautix
Chinese military naval signals reconnaisance satellite. 8 launches, the first on 2004.09.08 (SJ-6A).
Under cover of the SJ (Shijian) Chinese scientific research series, the government began launching pairs of satellites in 2006 that were believed to have a military ELINT mission.
The satellites were placed in sun-synchronous orbits at 600 km altitude. The second was separated about a minute after the first.
The second pair was launched two years after the first. Chinese ELINT systems had been tested on earlier flights of the manned Shenzhou spacecraft's orbital module.
