China’s latest team of astronauts has successfully reached their destination in orbit.
The Shenzhou 17 mission’s three spaceflyers arrived at China’s Tiangong space station early Thursday morning (Oct. 26), just 6.5 hours after lifting off atop a Long March 2F rocket from the Gobi Desert.
The trio joined the three Shenzhou 16 astronauts already aboard Tiangong, who warmly welcomed them as they entered the station. The six spaceflyers then gathered to deliver a message to Mission Control and the world.
In unison (in Mandarin; translation by Chinese broadcaster CCTV), they said, “Build a dream at the Tiangong space station and continue to work hard. China’s space station is always worth looking forward to.”
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The Shenzhou 17 crew is comprised of mission commander Tang Hongbo, 48, and former fighter pilots Tang Shengjie, 34, and Jiang Xinlin, 35. They are the youngest group to visit Tiangong, which China started assembling in low Earth orbit in April 2021 and completed after approximately 18 months.
Over the next six months, the Shenzhou 17 astronauts will live and work on the space station, conducting various scientific experiments and maintenance tasks. One of their anticipated tasks is a spacewalk to inspect and potentially repair Tiangong’s solar arrays, which have suffered damage from debris impacts and micrometeoroid strikes.
“Currently, space debris is increasing, so the impact of small space objects on long-duration operational spacecraft is inevitable,” said Lin Xiqiang, deputy director of the China Manned Space Agency, during a prelaunch press conference for Shenzhou 17.
“Previous inspections revealed that the space station’s solar panels have been hit several times by small objects in space, causing minor damage. This was taken into account during our design,” Lin added.
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The arrival of Shenzhou 17 marks the conclusion of the Shenzhou 16 mission, which arrived at Tiangong in late May. The Shenzhou 16 astronauts — Jing Haipeng, Zhu Yangzhu, and Gui Haichao — are scheduled to return to Earth on October 31.
Tiangong is a T-shaped structure consisting of three modules and is about 20% as massive as the International Space Station. Shenzhou 17 is the seventh crewed mission to reach the Chinese outpost to date.
