- Youngest line-up, new experiments pave way for future moon mission
BEIJING (Agencies): China Space Station on Wednesday welcomed the arrival of the new batch of residents – the youngest-ever crew comprising of Shenzhou-19 mission commander Cai Xuzhe and new taikonaut Song Lingdong and female taikonaut Wang Haoze, both of whom were born in 1990, at 12:51 pm, after the manned spacecraft successfully docked with the space station combination at 11 am, 6.5 hours after the lift-off from northwest China’s Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center.
Wang Ya’nan, chief editor of Beijing-based Aerospace Knowledge magazine, emphasized that Shenzhou-19 mission stands out. With its young lineup, the involvement of a female taikonaut and scheduled experiment subjects during the mission, including the unprecedented exposure experiment of the bricks made from simulated lunar soil – a potential building material for future habitats on the moon, the mission carries great importance for the country’s development of future manned lunar projects.
Cai returned to the China Space Station on the Shenzhou-19 manned mission just 22 months after his last flight on Shenzhou-14, setting a record of the shortest interval between missions in the history of Chinese taikonauts. Song and Wang were both born in 1990 and members of the country’s third batch taikonauts. The Shenzhou-19 mission is their debut in space. Wang is also the country’s first female spaceflight engineer, according to the China Manned Space Agency on Tuesday.
This mission marks the fourth crewed flight in the application and development phase of the space station and the 33rd flight of China’s manned space program. Its primary goals are to complete an in-orbit crew rotation with the Shenzhou-18 crew, reside on the space station for about six months, conduct space science and application experiments, perform extravehicular activities (EVAs), manage cargo entry and exit, install and recover space debris protection devices and other external equipment on the space station, Lin Xiqiang, a CMSA spokesperson revealed in a press conference on Tuesday.
The mission will also involve public outreach, space education, and payload experiments to further enhance space station operational efficiency and maximize its overall utility, Lin said.
During their stay in orbit, the Shenzhou-19 crew will receive the Tianzhou-8 cargo spacecraft and the Shenzhou-20 crewed spacecraft, with their return to the Dongfeng landing site scheduled in late April or early May, per the spokesperson.
After the in-orbit crew rotation with the Shenzhou-19 crew, the Shenzhou 18 crew is set to return to the Dongfeng landing site on November 4, Lin said.