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Great leap forward for China's space program
Source: Xinhua |
September 30, 2011, Friday
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Print Edition
Print Edition
CHINA successfully launched an experimental craft yesterday, paving the way for its first space station.
The Tiangong-1, or "Heavenly Palace," blasted off from the Jiuquan satellite Launch Center in the northwestern Gansu Province at 9:16pm.
The module was shot into space aboard a Long March-2FT1 rocket.
It is to move into an orbit 350 kilometers above the Earth and conduct surveys of Chinese farmland using special cameras, along with experiments involving growing crystals in zero gravity.
The unmanned module will test space docking with a spacecraft later this year, paving the way for China to operate a permanent space station around 2020 and making it the world's third country to do so.
Unlike previous Chinese space vehicles, Tiangong-1 has a docking facility which allows it to be connected to multiple modules in order to assemble an experimental station in low orbit.
Tiangong-1 will orbit the Earth for about a month awaiting the arrival of the Shenzhou-8 unmanned spacecraft. Once the two vehicles successfully rendezvous, they will conduct the first space docking at a height of 340 kilometers above Earth's surface.
After two docking tests with the Shenzhou-8, Tiangong-1 will await the Shenzhou-9, followed by the Shenzhou-10, which may carry a female astronaut, in the next two years.
If the astronaut in the Shenzhou-10 mission succeeds with the manual space docking, China will have become the third nation after the United States and Russia to master the technology.
President Hu Jintao watched the launch from the Beijing Aerospace Flight Control Center yesterday, two days before China's National Day, witnessing the latest endeavor of China's manned space program since 1992.
Premier Wen Jiabao was at the launch center to watch the launch process.
"Tiangong-1 has gone into the dark sky! We Chinese are on the way to inhabiting the vast universe," wrote Qichaoxiguanghai on Weibo.
With a room of 15 cubic meters for two to three astronauts to conduct research and experiments in the future, China's first space lab module is hardly the size of a palace.
But its name "Heavenly Palace" speaks of a dream home from Chinese folklore, long envisioned as a secret place where deities reside.
The 8.5-ton module is to stay aloft for two years, after which two other experimental modules are to be launched for additional tests before the actual station is launched in three sections between 2020 and 2022.
The space station, which is yet to be formally named, is the most ambitious project in China's exploration of space, which also calls for landing on the moon, possibly with astronauts.
The Tiangong-1, or "Heavenly Palace," blasted off from the Jiuquan satellite Launch Center in the northwestern Gansu Province at 9:16pm.
The module was shot into space aboard a Long March-2FT1 rocket.
It is to move into an orbit 350 kilometers above the Earth and conduct surveys of Chinese farmland using special cameras, along with experiments involving growing crystals in zero gravity.
The unmanned module will test space docking with a spacecraft later this year, paving the way for China to operate a permanent space station around 2020 and making it the world's third country to do so.
Unlike previous Chinese space vehicles, Tiangong-1 has a docking facility which allows it to be connected to multiple modules in order to assemble an experimental station in low orbit.
Tiangong-1 will orbit the Earth for about a month awaiting the arrival of the Shenzhou-8 unmanned spacecraft. Once the two vehicles successfully rendezvous, they will conduct the first space docking at a height of 340 kilometers above Earth's surface.
After two docking tests with the Shenzhou-8, Tiangong-1 will await the Shenzhou-9, followed by the Shenzhou-10, which may carry a female astronaut, in the next two years.
If the astronaut in the Shenzhou-10 mission succeeds with the manual space docking, China will have become the third nation after the United States and Russia to master the technology.
President Hu Jintao watched the launch from the Beijing Aerospace Flight Control Center yesterday, two days before China's National Day, witnessing the latest endeavor of China's manned space program since 1992.
Premier Wen Jiabao was at the launch center to watch the launch process.
"Tiangong-1 has gone into the dark sky! We Chinese are on the way to inhabiting the vast universe," wrote Qichaoxiguanghai on Weibo.
With a room of 15 cubic meters for two to three astronauts to conduct research and experiments in the future, China's first space lab module is hardly the size of a palace.
But its name "Heavenly Palace" speaks of a dream home from Chinese folklore, long envisioned as a secret place where deities reside.
The 8.5-ton module is to stay aloft for two years, after which two other experimental modules are to be launched for additional tests before the actual station is launched in three sections between 2020 and 2022.
The space station, which is yet to be formally named, is the most ambitious project in China's exploration of space, which also calls for landing on the moon, possibly with astronauts.
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