Beijing, Oct. 16 (BNA) The Chinese manned space mission has arrived at the Tiangong (Sky Palace) space station, which is currently being built.
China’s manned spaceflight program announced, on Saturday morning, that the three-member crew arrived at the space station about six and a half hours after their launch into space.
The crew docked at the base unit Tianhe (Heavenly Piece) at 6:56 a.m. Beijing time on Saturday (2256 GMT Friday).
The astronauts will live and work there for about six months on China’s longest-running space mission to date.
Their Chinese Long March 2F rocket lifted off from Jiuquan Spaceport on the edge of the Gobi Desert at 12:23 a.m. Saturday (1623 GMT Friday).
So far, the longest astronauts have spent aboard the space station is three months, which is the current Chinese record for time spent in space.
The astronauts are 55-year-old Commander Zhai Zhigang, 41-year-old Yi Guangfu, and 41-year-old Wang Yaping.
Wang, who was the second Chinese woman in space when she lived aboard the Tiangong 1 space laboratory in 2013, is set to become the first Chinese woman to complete a spacewalk, according to CMS.
Before the flight, the deputy director of China’s space program, Lin Shiqiang, told reporters at the Jiuquan Spaceport that astronauts from other countries would also be invited to join future missions.
Lin said the space station could become a platform for international cooperation, including joint space flights, after its completion in the next stage.
He noted that Chinese astronauts have already trained in Russia and Europe. He said European astronauts also visited China in 2017 for survival training.
Astronauts from 15 countries were aboard the International Space Station (ISS), but they weren’t Chinese astronauts at all.
The reason was the opposition of the United States. In 2011, the US Congress passed a law banning any contact with the Chinese space program on national security grounds.
During their mission, the Chinese crew plans to test the core module systems, work outside the spacecraft and conduct scientific experiments.
Prior to their stay, six tons of supplies, fuel and equipment were transported to the base unit by cargo flight at the end of September.
Next year, two more units are scheduled to be connected to the Tianhe Central Unit to complete the Chinese space station.
NS