China launches spy satellite! See rocket shed insulation tiles Duration: 01:05 China s Long March 4C rocket launched the Yaogan-33 remote sensing satellite from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center on Dec. 29, 2020. The rocket shed insulation tiles during lift off, a normal occurrence. Credit: Space.com | footage courtesy: China Central Television | produced & edited by [Steve Spaleta](http://www.twitter.com/stevespaleta)
Long March 4C lifts off from Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center on Dec. 27, 2020.
China completed a busy year that saw the nation tie its own record for launch attempts with the successful orbiting of a remote sensing satellite and a secondary nanosat on Sunday.
A Long March 4C rocket lifted off from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center at 11:44 p.m.. local time carrying the Yaogan Weixing-33 (R) spacecraft. The spacecraft will be “mainly used for scientific experiment research, marine and land resource surveys and other tasks,” the China National Space Administration (CNSA) said.
Yaogan Weixing-33 (R) is the replacement for a similarly named remote sensing satellite that was lost due to the failure of a Long March 4C booster in May 2019.