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CZ-2C/3/SMA Long March Space Launch Vehicles

10-9-09

CZ-2C/3/SMA

The Chinese CZ-2C/3/SM A booster appears to be another variant of the CZ-2C work horse booster with perhaps three stages. Its first two stages are known to be the standard CZ-2C design with an added solid motor third stage possible the SpaB-140C and possible an FG class solid motor for its Sun Synchronous identified missions. This gives it a height on the order of 40 meters with a known diameter of 3.35 meters utilizing highly toxic hypergolic UDMH and nitrogen tetroxide storable propellants in its first two stages. It was first flown on September 7, 2008 for its environmental disaster monitoring operations payload. It was launched from the Taiyuan (TSLC) Satellite Launch Center. Only one of these booster configurations has been launched so far with a 100 % success rate. The payload was the Huanjing 1A SMMS Huanjing 1B For further information on the basic CZ-2C first two stages see the CZ-2C Chinese launch vehicle section see:http://www.globalsecurity.org/space/world/china/cz-2c.htm The CZ-2C is derived from the CSS-4 ballistic missile and consists of two stages.