Commercial CERES-1 Y9 rocket sends new satellites to twilight orbit

STORY: Commercial CERES-1 Y9 rocket sends new satellites to twilight orbit SHOOTING TIME: Dec. 5, 2023 DATELINE: Dec. 6, 2023 LENGTH: 00:01:03 LOCATION: JIUQUAN, China CATEGORY: TECHNOLOGY SHOTLIST: 1. various of the rocket's launch 2. various of the rocket STORYLINE: China on Tuesday launched a CERES-1 Y9 carrier rocket from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in northwest China, sending two new satellites to their planned orbits. The commercial rocket blasted off at 7:33 a.m. (Beijing Time). The launch was the 11th flight mission to use the CERES-1 rocket series. Developed by Beijing-based Galactic Energy, CERES-1 is a small-scale solid-propellant carrier rocket designed to send micro-satellites to low orbit. The commercial rocket is 1.4 meters in diameter, and has a total length of about 20 meters and a takeoff weight of 33 tonnes. It can carry a payload of up to 300 kg to a sun-synchronous orbit at an altitude of 500 km. With the capacity to carry both a single satellite and multipl

Sea urchins return to Sea of Japan coastal waters

Sea urchins return to Sea of Japan coastal waters

FUKUI, Japan - A diver is all smiles with a bagful of sea urchins she gathered after three hours of work on Aug. 6, the last day of the urchin-gathering season off the coast of Fukui Prefecture. Fishermen in the area say the volume of sea urchins caught off the Fukui coast have more or less returned to normal 10 years after the Russian oil tanker Nakhodka carrying 20,000 kiloliters of fuel oil broke up in stormy weather in the Sea of Japan and up to 6,200 kiloliters of oil washed up in the coasts of 10 prefectures. At one point, the volume of sea urchins gathered by a local fishermen's cooperative in Fukui dropped to 19 kilograms, compared with an annual average of 300 kg before the spill, fishermen say.

Smart technologies aid agricultural production in China's Henan

STORY: Smart technologies aid agricultural production in China's Henan DATELINE: Aug. 12, 2022 LENGTH: 00:01:38 LOCATION: ZHENGZHOU, China CATEGORY: TECHNOLOGY/AGRICULTURE SHOTLIST: 1. SOUNDBITE 1 (Chinese): ZOU HUIYI, Farmer of Zouzhuang Village 2. SOUNDBITE 2 (Chinese): LI TONGGUO, Agricultural technician 3. various of the farmland in Xichuan County 3. various of the smart equipment STORYLINE: As a major grain-producing area in China, Henan Province has actively explored the construction of smart farmlands. Zou Huiyi, who has planted more than 100 mu (about 16.5 acres) of farmland, showed a smart irrigation system at his farmland in Zouzhuang Village of Xichuan County. SOUNDBITE 1 (Chinese): ZOU HUIYI, Farmer of Zouzhuang Village "Irrigation is convenient now by using my phone. After downloading the app, I just need to speak to my phone to start or stop the irrigation. In the past, if you couldn't irrigate the farmlands properly, the yields were merely about 300 kg per mu (about 0.16 acres), or 400 kg

Sea urchins return to Sea of Japan coastal waters

Sea urchins return to Sea of Japan coastal waters

FUKUI, Japan - A diver is all smiles with a bagful of sea urchins she gathered after three hours of work on Aug. 6, the last day of the urchin-gathering season off the coast of Fukui Prefecture. Fishermen in the area say the volume of sea urchins caught off the Fukui coast have more or less returned to normal 10 years after the Russian oil tanker Nakhodka carrying 20,000 kiloliters of fuel oil broke up in stormy weather in the Sea of Japan and up to 6,200 kiloliters of oil washed up in the coasts of 10 prefectures. At one point, the volume of sea urchins gathered by a local fishermen's cooperative in Fukui dropped to 19 kilograms, compared with an annual average of 300 kg before the spill, fishermen say. (Kyodo)