Tanegashima Space Center

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The H-2A F11 launch vehicle lifts off from Tanegashima Space Center

The Tanegashima Space Center (種子島宇宙センター, tanegashima uchū sentā^?) (TNSC) is one of Japan's space development facilities. It is located on Tanegashima Island, 115 km south of Kyūshū. It was established in 1969 when the National Space Development Agency of Japan (NASDA) was formed. It is now run by JAXA.

The activities that take place at TNSC include assembly, testing, launching and tracking of satellites, as well as rocket engine firing tests. It is Japan's largest space development center.

1 Facilities
2 Kaguya
3 See also
4 External links
5 References

[edit] Facilities

There are several facilities at the TNSC. The two launch complexes are the Yoshinobu and the Osaki. Yoshinobu has two launch pads; one for lighter spacecraft (up to 2 tons for geostationary orbit), and the other for heavier spacecraft (2-4 tons). One of the firing test facilities is the Yoshinobu Firing Test Stand, where testing of the H-IIA first stage engine LE-7A takes place. There are also buildings for assembly of spacecraft, and for radar and optical tracking of launched spacecraft.

[edit] Kaguya

On September 14, 2007, Eriko Sunada confirmed that Japan succeeded in launching lunar orbit explorer "Kaguya" (SELENE) on an H-2A rocket. Kaguya, nicknamed after a princess in a folk story, is the world's largest lunar orbit explorer and cost 55 billion JPY. H-2A (Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Ltd.<7011>), launch vehicle No. 13, air lifted with the spacecraft at 10:31 a.m. (1:31 a.m. GMT) from the Space Center.

Kaguya's mission is to gather data on the Moon's origin and geological evolution, and will penetrate into a lunar orbit on Oct. 4. China will launch a similar lunar explorer in autumn, and India and the United States in 2008. In 2018, the United States, European countries, Russia, and China will send manned lunar exploration missions with the possibility of a base construction on the moon.^[1] ^[2]