The Gaofen 3 Earth resources radar satellite has been launched by China at 2255 GMT on 9 August 2016. The satellite was sent into a Sun-synchronous low Earth orbit by a Long March 4C launch vehicle flying out of Taiyuan, in China.
The satellite is equipped with a C-Band SAR radar with 12 modes to provide imagery with a best resolution of 1 metre and a swath of 10 to 650 km depending on the mode. The spacecraft was built by the Chinese Academy of Space Technology (CAST) using its CAST-3000B bus design.