Science & Technology

01 Mar 2019; AP: NASA’s newest Mars lander has started digging into the red planet, but hit a few snags, scientists said Friday.

The German drilling instrument on the InSight lander struck what appeared to be a couple of stones. It only managed to burrow between half a foot (18 centimeters) and about 1 ½ feet (50 centimeters), far short of the first dig’s goal, said the German Aerospace Center.

The hammering device in the “mole” was developed by the Astronika engineering company in Poland.

WASHINGTON, March 2 (Xinhua) -- An American spacecraft designed to fly astronauts to the International Space Station (ISS) from the United States was launched Saturday morning for its debut unmanned flight.

SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket, carrying the Crew Dragon spacecraft, lifted off at 2:49 a.m. Eastern Time (0749 GMT) from Launch Complex 39A at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA)'s Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

BEIJING, March 1 (Xinhua) -- The China-developed  MA700 turboprop aircraft has entered the trial-manufacturing and test phase, announced the state-owned Aviation Industry Corporation of China (AVIC) Friday.

The first MA700 is expected to roll off the production line this September.

The MA700 is the third member of China's "Morden Ark(MA)" regional airplane family following the MA60 and MA600. The AVIC is striving to conduct the maiden flight by the end of 2019, said AVIC.

28 Feb 2019; AP: Security experts say the U.S. government is likely exaggerating the threat it says the Chinese telecommunications giant Huawei poses to the world’s next-generation wireless networks.

Washington has mounted an intense diplomatic offensive that paints Huawei as an untrustworthy servant of Beijing’s intelligence agencies.

KOMSOMOLSK-ON-AMUR, February 26. /TASS/. The first serial-produced Sukhoi Su-57 fifth-generation fighter jet will arrive for Russia’s Aerospace Force in 2019, Deputy CEO of the Sukhoi Aircraft Company Alexander Pekarsh said on Tuesday.

Pekarsh heads the Company’s branch in Komsomolsk-on-Amur in the Russian Far East where Su-57 planes are manufactured.

PARIS, February 26. /TASS/. Russia’s Soyuz-ST-B carrier rocket has completed all necessary checks and has been cleared for the February 27 launch to put first OneWeb satellites into orbit, Arianespace CEO Stephane Israel said in a Twitter post on Tuesday.

"Soyuz is approved for flight! Today’s launch readiness review cleared the medium-lift workhorse for tomorrow’s liftoff with the first six satellites in OneWeb’s constellation," he said.

MOSCOW, February 27. /TASS/. In an interview with the Turkey’s NTV channel, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan expressed hope that Washington would eventually change its mind on Turkey’s plans to buy S-400 missile defense systems from Russia.

"At present, relevant agencies conduct all the necessary talks, and will continue to do so, including a speech before the Congress. I hope that this wrongful approach by the United States would change," he said, commenting on the possibility of US sanctions over the deal.

MOSCOW, Feb. 26 (Xinhua) -- Russia plans to launch seven spacecraft to the International Space Station (ISS) this year, the Russian state space corporation Roscosmos said Tuesday.

It said in a statement that the Soyuz MS-12 manned spacecraft will carry Russian cosmonaut Alexei Ovchinin and U.S. astronauts Christina Koch and Nick Haig on March 14.

MOSCOW, February 25. /TASS/. The first direction-finding system designed to trace radio interference and thus provide for the stable operation of radio-electronic equipment has undergone trials in field conditions, the press office of Russia’s RTI hi-tech firm told TASS on Monday.

MOSCOW, February 25. /TASS/. The preliminary date set for the first space flight by a United Arab Emirates astronaut has been set for September 25, the chief of the Gagarin Space Training Center, Pavel Vlasov, has told TASS.

"At this point, yes (it’s September 25). This agreement is to be confirmed by the Russian side later today in the form of an authorized program for flights to the ISS this year," Vlasov said when asked if it was true the UAE’s first astronaut would be put in space on September 25.