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Published: April 17,2022
By Cao Qingqing, Guo Meipin
China’s Shenzhou-13 astronauts, or taikonauts, ZhaiZhigang, Wang Yaping and Ye Guangfu, returned home safely on Saturday morning after a record breaking 183-day mission in space.
The return capsule carrying the trio touched down at the Dongfeng landing site in north China’s Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region at 9:56 a.m. after a journey of about nine hours from the country’s space station.
China declared the Shenzhou-13 mission a complete success after the medical team waiting on site confirmed that all three taikonauts were in good health.
Zhai, the commander of the mission, was the first to come out of the capsule, waving his hand to the cheering crowd on site with a big smile. He said he felt very good.
He was followed by Wang, the first female taikonautwho had entered China’s space station. “I want to tell my daughter, mom returned after reaching for the stars,” she said.
Ye exited last from the capsule. “My first flight to space lasted six months, which was a challenge to me. My space dream came true,” he said.
A fast trip home
The Shenzhou-13 crew’s trip home was cut to just nine hours.
At 12:44 a.m., the Shenzhou-13 spacecraft, consisting of three modules – the return capsule, the orbital module and the propelling module – detached from the Tianhe core module of China’s space station, which orbits the Earth at an altitude of about 400 kilometers.
At 09:06 a.m., the return capsule and the propelling module separated from the orbital module.
At 09:30 a.m., the braking engine of the return capsule started working to slow it down, which then separated from the propelling module.
About 14 minutes later, the parachute of the return capsule was deployed.
And at 9:56 a.m., the return capsule successfully landed, and the recovery team
arrived at the landing point immediately.
Highlights of the Shenzhou-13 mission
The Shenzhou-13 mission, launched on October 16, 2021, was the second manned mission for the assembly of China’s space station, following last year’s Shenzhou-12 mission that lasted three months from June 17 to September 17.
It’s the longest-ever crewed mission in the country’s manned space program.
During their stay in the space station, the Shenzhou-13 crew verified key technologies for the construction of the space station, including in-orbit transposition of spacecraft and robotic arm operation of heavy loads, which accumulated valuable experience for the subsequent in-orbit assembly and construction of the space station.
Two spacewalks were carried out by the crew. On November 7, 2021, Wang became the first female taikonaut to conduct a spacewalk.
Besides scientific missions, the crew also gave two live science lectures from the space station, during which they conducted various experiments and answered questions from students watching the class on Earth.
What to expect next?
With the completion of the Shenzhou-13 mission, the “technology verification phase” of China space station project is completed, which will enter the “in-orbit construction phase.”
The construction of the space station is scheduled to be completed in 2022.
During the year, China will first launch the Tianzhou-4 cargo spacecraft followed by the Shenzhou-14 crewed spaceship, with Tianzhou-4 set to deliver supplies for the Shenzhou-14 crew. During their stay, two lab modules, Wentian and Mengtian, will be sent successively into space.
Each lab module will first dock with the front docking port of the core module and will be transferred by the space station’s robotic arm to the side docking ports on each side of the core module.
A T-shape complex will then be formed, at which point the construction of the space station would be complete.
The Tianzhou-5 cargo spacecraft and the Shenzhou-15 crewed spaceship will then be launched to begin the in-orbit rotation of the crew at the space station.
Moreover, a telescope capsule will be sent into space to fly in the same orbit as the space station to provide observation data for astronomical and physical studies.
After completing the space station, China plans to carry out more extensive and in-depth international cooperation
cgtn.com
