THE NEW SPACE RACE: Chinese sats appear to be attempting first-ever on-orbit refueling, sat tracking firms say.

A Chinese satellite designed for refueling missions has been dancing awfully close to another Chinese bird in orbit, raising the possibility Beijing is about to pull off — or already has pulled off — the first-ever on-orbit gas-up, according to satellite tracking firms.

Last week Slingshot Aerospace watched China’s experimental SJ-25, which Beijing launched in January and has said publicly said was meant for refueling missions, approach another satellite, SJ-21. But the view from terrestrial telescopes wasn’t able to confirm docking, much less refueling, so Slingshot concluded the data was “inconclusive” as to what exactly happened.

“If docking did occur, then the duration of that event would be no more than three hours,” a Slingshot spokesperson told Breaking Defense of the June 13 event.
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A successful space refueling between satellites, known in US Space Force parlance as a space mobility operation, would be “definitely a big deal,” according to Victoria Samson, Secure World Foundation’s chief director of Space Security and Stability.

Indeed.