Posted: Sat, Jan 29, 2022, 10:39 AM ET (1539 GMT)
A Chinese satellite recently towed a defunct navigation satellite out of geostationary orbit. Data from space tracking firms show that the Shijian-21 satellite docked with the defunct Beidou-2 G2 navigation satellite and performed a large burn Jan. 22., moving the spacecraft out of the GEO belt. Shijian-21 undocked from Beidou-2 G2 on Jan. 26, leaving that spacecraft in a disposal orbit well above GEO, and has since returned to GEO. Beidou-2 G2 failed in orbit following its 2009 launch, has been drifting since 2010 and may have partially fragmented at some point. China describes Shijian-21, launched last October, as a space debris mitigation satellite but has not released details about the satellite or its planned objectives.

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