Bradley Perrett covered China, Japan, South Korea and Australia. He is a Mandarin-speaking Australian.
Before joining Aviation Week in 2006 he was a macroeconomics, politics and aerospace journalist with Reuters. Perrett holds a bachelor’s degree in law from Macquarie University, Sydney. He left Aviation Week in 2020.
BEIJING — A Venezuelan order for Y-8 airlifters from Avic Aircraft has been cut to eight units from 12, although it still represents the largest export contract so far for the type, a Chinese development of the Antonov An-12. A banner at a signing ceremony shows that Venezuela has ordered the Y-8F-200, the civil derivative of the Y-8C, which was the first fully pressurized version of the aircraft. The Y-8 is about the same size as the Lockheed Martin C-130 Hercules.
BEIJING — China has renewed its polar-orbiting weather satellite group with the in-orbit verification of the Fengyun 3B. With the satellite now going into service alongside sibling Fengyun 3A, China will have a global observation interval of 6 hr., down from 12 previously. Fengyun 3B was subject to half a year of in-orbit checkouts after its Nov. 5 launch.
BEIJING — China will send its Chang’e 2 lunar probe to the second Sun-Earth Lagrangian point next month, laying groundwork for Martian missions. The opportunity to send Chang’e 2 into deep space from Earth has resulted from the good condition of the spacecraft as it approaches the end of its lunar observation mission, says the China Academy of Sciences.
