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China's Kuaizhou-11 (KZ-11) solid-fuel carrier rocket will send six satellites into space during its first mission, according to the rocket's developer and producer China Aerospace Science and Industry Corp (CASIC).
The company announced the news Wednesday at the Third China (International) Commercial Aerospace Forum in Wuhan, capital of central China's Hubei Province.
The Kuaizhou-11 rocket will be launched via a mobile launch vehicle. With a liftoff mass of 78 tonnes, the rocket was designed to launch low Earth and Sun synchronous orbit satellites.
"Kuaizhou," which is Chinese for "fast ship," is a low cost solid-fuelled carrier rocket with high reliability and a short preparation period.
The CASIC is responsible for developing and manufacturing the new solid-fuel rocket, as well as launching six satellites by early 2018.
Globally, the launch cost of small commercial carrier rockets usually ranges from 25,000 to 40,000 US dollars per kilogram of payload, according to a CASIC spokesperson.
The spokesperson said Kuaizhou rockets are price competitive as, while the launch cost of the Kuaizhou-1A was less than 20,000 US dollars per kg of payload, the Kuaizhou-11 rocket is less than 10,000 US dollars.
For its first commercial mission in January, the Kuaizhou-1A rocket sent three satellites into space.
(ASIA PACIFIC DAILY)
