washington while the world was occupied with nasa and space x launching first manned orbital spaceflight from the us china made space strides of its own with two successful rocket flights back to backaccording to spacecom china blasted off two flights at the same time nasa launched its demo2 mission toward the international space station on may 30beijing first launched two new technologydemonstrating satellites at 413 am beijing time the satellites rose successfully into space aboard a long march11 rocket according to chinese state media outlet cctvpeng kunya a chief designer of the long march11 said that it was the first time that the long march11 was launched from the xichang satellite launch center proving its adaptability to different launch sites cctv said in its reportwithin 36 hours china sent another satellite duo aloft from the countrys northwest regiona long march2d rocket blasted off from the jiuquan satellite launch center on may 31 at 453 pm beijing time 453 am edt or 0853 gmtaccording to xinhua one of the satellites was gaofen9 the civilian remote sensing satellite can take photographs with a resolution of roughly 33 feet 1 meter it will be used in land surveys urban planning road network design and crop yield estimates as well as disaster relief xinhua statedthe other satellite is head4 it is designed to support the internet of things iot which allows connected devices to send and receive information from orbiton may 30 spacexs crew dragon spacecraft successfully took off from kennedy space center for the international space station iss with two nasa astronauts robert behnken and douglas hurleythe spacecraft is the first to take the american astronauts to orbit from american soil in nearly a decade and took off at 322 pm eastern time et