The Long March 3C (), also known as the Changzheng 3C, CZ-3C and LM-3C, is a Chinese

orbit In celestial mechanics, an orbit (also known as orbital revolution) is the curved trajectory of an object such as the trajectory of a planet around a star, or of a natural satellite around a planet, or of an artificial satellite around an ...

launch vehicle A launch vehicle is typically a rocket-powered vehicle designed to carry a payload (a crewed spacecraft or satellites) from Earth's surface or lower atmosphere to outer space. The most common form is the ballistic missile-shaped multistage ...

. It is launched from Launch Complex 2 and 3 at the

Xichang Satellite Launch Center The Xichang Satellite Launch Center (XSLC), also known as the Xichang Space Center, is a spaceport in China. It is located in (), Mianning county, approximately northwest of Xichang, Liangshan Yi Autonomous Prefecture in Sichuan. It is op ...

(XSLC). A three-stage rocket with two strapon liquid rocket boosters, it is a member of the Long March 3 rocket family, and was derived from the

Long March 3B The Long March 3B (), also known as the CZ-3B and LM-3B, is a Chinese orbital launch vehicle. Introduced in 1996, it is launched from Launch Area 2 and 3 at the Xichang Satellite Launch Center in Sichuan. A three-stage rocket with four strap-on ...

. It was designed to fill a gap in payload capacities between the

Long March 3A The Long March 3A (), also known as the Chang Zheng 3A, CZ-3A and LM-3A, is a Chinese orbital carrier rocket design. It is a 3-stage rocket, and is usually used to place communications satellites and Beidou navigation satellites into geosynch ...

and 3B.

Launch statistics

Launches

It made its maiden flight on 25 April 2008, at 15:35

UTC Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) is the primary time standard globally used to regulate clocks and time. It establishes a reference for the current time, forming the basis for civil time and time zones. UTC facilitates international communica ...

. The payload for the first launch was the Tianlian I-01 data relay communications satellite. The second carried the Compass-G2

navigation satellite A satellite navigation or satnav system is a system that uses satellites to provide autonomous geopositioning. A satellite navigation system with global coverage is termed global navigation satellite system (GNSS). , four global systems are op ...

and was conducted on 14 April 2009. The third launch was made on 16 January 2010, with the Compass-G1 satellite. The fourth carrying the Compass-G3 navigation satellite was launched on 2 June 2010. On 1 October 2010, it successfully launched China's second lunar probe,

Chang'e 2 Chang'e 2 (; ) is a Chinese uncrewed lunar probe that was launched on 1 October 2010. It was a follow-up to the Chang'e 1 lunar probe, which was launched in 2007. Chang'e 2 was part of the first phase of the Chinese Lunar Exploration Program, ...

. An enhanced version, named Long March 3C/E, debuted during the launch of

Chang'e 5-T1 Chang'e 5-T1 () was an experimental robotic spacecraft that was launched to the Moon on 23 October 2014, by the China National Space Administration (CNSA) to conduct atmospheric re-entry tests on the capsule design planned to be used in the Ch ...

on 23 October 2014. On 30 March 2015, the Yuanzheng

upper stage A multistage rocket or step rocket is a launch vehicle that uses two or more rocket ''stages'', each of which contains its own Rocket engine, engines and Rocket propellant, propellant. A ''tandem'' or ''serial'' stage is mounted on top of anoth ...

was used on top of a Long March 3C launch vehicle for the first time.

List of launches

References

Long March (rocket family) Vehicles introduced in 2008 Long stubs with short prose {{rocket-stub

Launch statistics

Launches

List of launches

See also

References