On Monday night around 8pm Beijing time, a new Chinese rocket explodedexploded/ɪkˈsploʊdɪd/L2爆炸to burst or break apart violently, usually with a loud sound shortly after takeoff. The 60-metre Long March 7A lifted off from the Wenchang Space Launch Site on the island of Hainan. It was carrying the ChinaSat-4B communications satellitesatellite/ˈsætəlaɪt/L1卫星a machine that is sent into space and moves around Earth to send signals for TV, phone, etc.. Only 90 seconds into the flight, the rocket erupted into a very huge fireball. Spectators near the launch site saw the explosion and the thick black smoke rising into the air.
The satellite was very expensive, costing over 1 billion yuan. It was going to provide radio, television and other communications services to users all around the world. State news agency Xinhua already confirmed the failure and said the rocket experienced an "anomalyanomaly/əˈnɑːməli/L2异常情况something that is different from what is normal or expected during flight". The cause of the problem is now under investigationinvestigation/ɪnˌvestɪˈɡeɪʃən/L2调查the process of examining something carefully to find out the truth. Both the rocket and the satellite were lost over the South China Sea.
This failure is a very rare event for China's newer-generation rockets. The Long March 7A is a workhorse for sending large satellites to high orbits. The loss of the satellite means its communications services will be delayed. In addition, the accident might affect the schedule of other planned launches. For example, another rocket launch was finally postponedpostponed/poʊstˈpoʊnd/L2推迟to delay an event to a later time directly because of this failure.
