Three Chinese astronauts who spent six months developing China's low orbit space station returned to Earth safely early Monday, the China Manned Space Agency (CMSA) said. The capsule of the spaceship Shenzhou-18' carrying astronauts Ye Guangfu, Li Cong and Li Guangsu, touched down at the Dongfeng landing site in north China's Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region at 1:24 am (Beijing Time). The three astronauts, after staying in orbit for 192 days, were all in good health and the Shenzhou-18 manned mission was a success, the CMSA said. Ye, the Shenzhou-18 mission commander, has become the first Chinese astronaut with an accumulative spaceflight time of more than a year, setting a new record for the longest duration of stay in orbit by a Chinese astronaut. He served as a crew member in the Shenzhou-13 mission from October 2021 to April 2022. "Chinese astronauts have flown to space in successive missions. I believe that the record of the duration in orbit will be broken in the near future
China on Tuesday announced plans to launch its fourth manned mission to replace the crew of its space station and named a three-member squad, including a woman, to man the low-orbit station for the next six months. China's crewed spaceship Shenzhou-19 is scheduled to be launched at 4.27 a.m.(Beijing Time) on Wednesday from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Centre in the country's northwest, the China Manned Space Agency (CMSA) announced. The launch will use a Long March-2F carrier rocket, said Lin Xiqiang, the deputy director of CMSA, at a press conference at the Jiuquan centre. Shenzhou-19 is the 33rd flight mission of China's manned space programme and the fourth manned mission during the application and development stage of China's space station. After entering orbit, the Shenzhou-19 spaceship will perform a fast-automated rendezvous and docking with the front port of the space station core module Tianhe in about 6.5 hours, forming a combination of three modules and three spacecraft,
China has made great strides in exploring space in recent years, rocketing astronauts to its own space station and bringing back rocks from the moon. Now it wants to turn those feats into scientific advances. The nation's leading scientific institute laid out an ambitious plan on Tuesday to become a global leader in space science by 2050. It listed a wide range of research areas including black holes, Mars and Jupiter, and the search for habitable planets and signs of extraterrestrial life. Our country's space science research in general is still in an initial stage, Ding Chibiao, a vice president of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, said at a news conference. It's a weakness that must be addressed on the path of building an aerospace power. The plan, jointly issued with the China National Space Administration and the China Manned Space Engineering Office, set a goal of making landmark achievements with significant international influence that drive breakthroughs in innovation and ..
The Egyptian Space Agency, Bahrain's National Space Science Agency, and Changchun Institute of Optics, Fine Mechanics and Physics signed an agreement for the joint development of hyperspectral camera
The China National Space Administration announced that Chang'e-6 "successfully landed at the designated landing area," the Xinhua News Agency reported
China is preparing to launch a lunar probe on Friday that would land on the far side of the moon and return with samples that could provide insights into geological and other differences between the less-explored region and the better-known near side. The unprecedented mission would be the latest advance in the increasingly sophisticated and ambitious space exploration program that is now competing with the US, still the leader in space. China already landed a rover on the moon's far side in 2019, the first country to do so. Free from exposure to Earth and other interference, the moon's somewhat mysterious far side is ideal for radio astronomy and other scientific work. Because the far side never faces Earth, a relay satellite is a needed to maintain communications. The Chang'e lunar exploration probe is named after the Chinese mythical moon goddess. The probe is being carried on a Long March-5 YB rocket set for liftoff on Friday evening from the Wenchang launch centre on the south
Chang'e-6 will rely on a relay satellite orbiting the moon for communication with the earth, and the mission involves an ascent from the moon's 'hidden' side during the return journey
The Shenzhou-18 spacecraft, along with its three passengers, launched atop a Long March-2F rocket from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Centre in northwest China on Thursday
China's space agency said on Wednesday that its latest lunar explorer had arrived at the launch site in preparation for a mission to the moon in the first half of this year. State broadcaster CCTV posted photos on its website of the unit under wraps as it was unloaded from a large cargo airplane earlier this week and then transported by flatbed truck to the Wenchang launch site on southern China's Hainan island. The announcement came a day after a US company abandoned a lunar landing planned for February 23 because of a fuel leak that started soon after takeoff on Monday. China and the US are both pursuing plans to land astronauts on the moon in what has become a growing rivalry in space. The US plans to do so in 2026, and China's target date is before 2030. The China National Space Administration said that pre-launch tests would be carried out on its Chang'e-6 probe. The mission's goals include bringing back samples from the far side of the moon. Another US moon lander from a Hou
The successful launch of LandSpace's Zhuque-2 puts China ahead of rivals such as Elon Musk's SpaceX and Jeff Bezos' Blue Origin
The country plans to send Chinese astronauts to the moon by 2030, China Manned Space Agency official Lin Xiqiang said at a briefing on Monday
China launched a new crew space station intending to put astronauts on the moon before the end of the decade. The crew will stay aboard the station for five months.
China on Tuesday successfully launched the Shenzhou-16 manned spaceship, sending three astronauts, including the first civilian to its space station combination for a five-month mission. The spaceship, atop a Long March-2F carrier rocket, blasted off from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Centre in northwest China at 9:31 AM (Beijing Time), according to the China Manned Space Agency (CMSA). About 10 minutes after the launch, Shenzhou-16 separated from the rocket and entered its designated orbit. The crew members are in good shape and the launch is a complete success, the CMSA declared, it said. The astronauts are expected to dock with the station's Tianhe core module about 400km above the ground after a journey of less than seven hours. For the first time, China has included a civilian in its rotating crew for the space station which otherwise remained a domain of the military personnel. Gui Haichao, a professor at Beihang University in Beijing regarded as a payload specialist was am
The announcement was made by Lin Xiqiang, Deputy Director of the China Manned Space Agency (CMSA), as China is preparing to send a third set of astronauts to its space station on Tuesday
China on Tuesday launched a spacecraft with a three-person crew to its under-construction space station amid intensifying competition with the United States. The Shenzhou-15 spaceship carrying the aircraft was launched from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Centre in northwest China. It carried three astronauts -- Fei Junlong, Deng Qingming, and Zhang Lu. Fei will be the commander of the mission, Ji Qiming, assistant to the director of the CMSA, told the media. The launch was carried out with a Long March-2F carrier rocket. The crew will stay in orbit for about six months, a period in which the construction of the low-orbit space station is expected to be completed.
The significant feature of China's under-construction space station is its two robotic arms, especially the long one over which the US has previously expressed concern
China in a note verbale to the UN has revealed that Space X satellites had two close encounters with China Space Station in the recent past, a media report said
President Xi Jinping spoke to the three astronauts stationed in China's space station and told them that the project is an important milestone in the country's ambitious space exploration programme
China is all set to send the first three crew members to its new space station for three months on Thursday morning
A three-man crew of astronauts will blast off in June for a three-month mission on China's new space station, according to a space official who was the country's first astronaut in orbit