Some media reports say that China is expected to start suborbital travel in 2025. What is suborbital flight?

Media reports that with the advancement of science and technology, China hopes to achieve suborbital flight in 2025. What is suborbital flight? It is flying in a high-altitude flight orbit 35-300 kilometers away from the earth. This kind of flight is usually used for missile launches or space tourism.

In the "2021 China's Aerospace" white paper released by the State Council Information Office on January 28, 2022, it was mentioned that in the next five years, China's aerospace will develop space tourism, space biopharmaceuticals, New business formats of the space economy such as space debris removal and space test services will enhance the scale efficiency of the aerospace industry? Among them, suborbital flight is a kind of flight that is more energy-saving than launching into orbit.

Flight in suborbital motion generally exhibits a trajectory of projectile motion. It cannot circle the earth once. Generally, the first cosmic speed cannot be reached during launch. After the launch reaches the highest point, the height will continue to decrease, and it will land before it circles back to the starting point. It is a projectile motion in a non-ideal state. It is usually in this state when launching a missile, and the shell will fall back to the ground.

The United States is already one step ahead of China in aerospace tourism. In 2022, Musk's company will have the first passenger in space on Falcon 9. They will spend eight days in space, and each passenger spent $5,500 (approximately 350 million yuan) for the trip. Bezos' Blue Origin's New Shepard rocket is a suborbital space travel that allows tourists to complete a 10-minute space trip in suborbital space. Virgin Galactic has also carried 41 passengers on commercial space travel. Tickets cost up to US$450,000 (equivalent to RMB 3.15 million).

my country's Zhongke Aerospace has announced a suborbital travel service in 2021, which can carry 7 passengers at an altitude of more than 100 kilometers at a time to experience a 3-5 minute space journey. Repeated trials have been successful. In the next few years, China's commercial space travel will be realized, and people can also realize their desire to travel in space.