China launched a six-month space mission with three astronauts on Thursday, Chinese media reported.
The Shenzhou-18 spacecraft lifted off from Jiuquan Space Centre on a Long March 2F rocket at 8:59 p.m. Beijing time and headed for the Tiangong space station, Xinhua news agency quoted China’s Manned Space Agency as saying.
After entering orbit, Shenzhou-18 will make a quick automatic rendezvous and docking with the radial port of the Tianhe space station’s main module, which will take about 6.5 hours.
Astronauts Ye Guangfu, Li Cong and Li Guangsu will stay in orbit for six months and are scheduled to return to the Dongfeng landing site in northern China’s Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region at the end of October this year.
During the mission, the astronauts’ main work will be space experiments and tests in advanced fields such as aerospace medicine, basic physics, materials science and life science. They will also attempt to set up an aquarium on board and try to grow fish in weightlessness.
The new crew will replace the Shenzhou-17 crew, which was sent to the station in October. Shenzhou-18 is the 32nd mission in China’s manned space programme and the third manned mission in the application and development phase of China’s space station.
Beijing also aims to send a crewed mission to the moon by 2030 and plans to build a base on the lunar surface.
